The 
 I on-Shakspere Question 
 
 W $&&§ Wroi&£ 
 
 By 
 
 C, S TOPES.
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 \

 
 THE 
 
 BACON-SHAKSPERE 
 QU ESTION 
 
 ANSWERED.
 
 ^y/t^u^s y/^/^4^-^. 
 
 BACON-SHAKSPERE 
 QUESTION 
 
 ANSWERED. 
 
 BY 
 
 C. S T O P E S. 
 
 " Non sans droict." 
 
 ftcconti ©tiition, <2Torrcctcti anu GnlarecU. 
 
 LONDON: 
 TRUBNER & CO., LUDGATE HILL 
 
 1889. 
 [All rights reserved.]
 
 ■KaQantgne £>«?# 
 
 BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO. 
 EDINBURGH AND LONDON
 
 S 2 ?*. 
 
 PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION. 
 
 The great Shaksperean scholars have considered it beneath 
 their dignity to answer the assertions of the Baconians. 
 " Silence " may be " golden " in regard to the character of 
 the living, but in defence of the character of the dead, I 
 think that speech is golden when it answers speech ; and 
 proof, when it contests proof. Hence I thought it not in 
 vain to put together the main results of the studies I had 
 undertaken on my own account during the past two years. 
 These may help to turn the balance of opinion in some 
 wavering minds, or to aid some warm Shakspereans (that are 
 too busy to go through original work on their own account) 
 to reconsider the subject justly, and "give a reason for the 
 faith that is in them." 
 
 C. STOPES.
 
 PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION. 
 
 During the four months that have elapsed since the publi- 
 cation of my little book comparing Bacon and Shakspere, 
 I have continued my studies at the British Museum and 
 elsewhere, so as to be able somewhat to correct its errors 
 and expand its materials in a second edition. The enormous 
 mass of matter at our disposal makes it impossible to do this 
 either thoroughly or fully. What I have aimed at is, first, 
 to suggest the lines of greatest distinction in Life, Character, 
 and Writing, without attempting to exhaust them (except in 
 the one new illustration), so that all may be tempted to read 
 for themselves and "see if these things be so." All may or 
 ought to be possessors of the works of Shakspere and 
 Bacon, and should be able to read them at home. Second, 
 to put before all, in a concise form, the most important in- 
 formation to be derived from antecedent, contemporary, ami 
 later literature, as only those who live near some great 
 treasure-house of books like the British Museum are able to 
 do, by seeing and comparing them together. I have seen 
 the originals of all I quote, except four or live, in which 
 case I quote my authority. Third, to show from these the 
 weaknesses of the Baconian theory. 
 
 Some few have thought my work in vain. It certainly 
 has not been so in regard to my own education, at least. 
 In regard to my subjects, I can only say that most men
 
 viii PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION. 
 
 would rather be tried in open court on a clear charge than 
 to have rumours gather around them affecting the multitude. 
 To allow statements to appear unanswered seems, at best, 
 too like accepting the Scotch verdict of "not proven." This 
 argues only weakness in the arguments of the accusers, and 
 not innocence on the part of the accused ; the accusation 
 haunts men's minds long after, and may, at any time, be 
 revived. But a clear case, openly tried, arguments fairly 
 sifted on both sides, can result in a unanimous verdict, boldly 
 given, of "not guilty," whereby the accused is freed from 
 all the consequence and reproach of the accusation, and men 
 forget it. If I am trespassing on the sphere of Senior 
 Counsel I regret it ; but I trust my action will not prejudice 
 the case. I have done the best I could under the circum- 
 stances. My desire is that the motto Shakspere chose to 
 bear through life, his works should also bear as his — 
 
 " Won sans droict." 
 CHARLOTTE CARMICHAEL 3TOPES. 
 
 Kemvyn, Norwood, London, 
 December iSSS.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 :uxp. PAGE 
 
 PREFACE v 
 
 SOME INTRODUCTORY DATES xi 
 
 INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER I 
 
 I. THE PROBABILITIES FROM KNOWN CHARACTER AND 
 
 EDUCATION OF THE WRITER OF THE PLAYS . 3 
 
 II. THE INTERNAL EVIDENCE OF SHAKSPERE'S PLAYS AND 
 
 bacon's books 2S 
 
 III. SPECIAL ILLUSTRATION 45 
 
 IV. WHETHER WERE THE POEMS AND PLAYS CLAIMED 
 
 BY SHAKSPERE OR BACON? 9° 
 
 V. EXTERNAL EVIDENCE 
 VI. THE HISTORY OF THE HERESV 
 VII. BACON'S CIPHERS 
 APPENDIX 
 INDEX 
 PRESS NOTICES 
 
 III 
 
 I8 5 
 199 
 229 
 259 
 
 267
 
 SOME INTRODUCTORY DATES. 
 
 1 558-1603. Elizabeth's Reign. 
 
 1575. The Lord Mayor expelled players from London. 
 They settled outside the liberty. 
 
 1576. Theatres built : — 
 
 1st. The Theatre \ outside the Uberty> 
 2nd. The Curtain J 
 3rd. Blackfriars, by Burbage, within. 
 A great controversy arose as to morality of plays. 
 
 1 576. Gosson writes for the stage. 
 
 1579. He alters his views, and brings out The Schoole of Abuse, 
 
 censuring plays, &c. ; dedicated to Sir Philip Sydney. 
 
 1583. Philip Stubbes, in his Anatomy of Abuses, exposed and 
 
 denounced Stage Plays and their Evils. 
 
 15S6. Sydney died. Shakspere came to London. 
 
 1 592. Greene, Chettle, Nash, and Harvey commenced a literary 
 
 controversy. 
 
 1593. The Globe on Bankside built. 
 
 1593. Venus and Adonis published and dedicated by the author 
 
 to Lord Southampton. 
 
 1594. Lucrccc published. 
 
 '595- Sydney's Apology for Poetry, in which he took the opposite 
 
 view to Stubbes, published. 
 
 1595. Clarke's Polimanteia gave first printed reference to I'cnus 
 
 and Adonis and Lucrecc as Shakspere's. 
 
 1597 Bacon's Essays published by the author. Shakspere's 
 
 Richard II., Richard III., and Romeo and Juliet pub- 
 lished by the printers as Shakspere's.
 
 xii SOME INTRODUCTORY DATES. 
 
 159S. Francis Meres, M.A., a graduate of both Universities, 
 
 noticed Shakspere with praise in Palladia Tamia. 
 
 1599. John Rainoldes published his Overthroio of Stage Plays. 
 
 1 60 1. John Shakspere died. 
 
 1601-2 (Jan. 18). Merry Wives of Windsor, as originally written, 
 licensed for the press ; printed 4to, 1602. 
 
 1606. The Return from Pernassus, acted about 1602, printed with 
 
 a highly eulogistic account and flattering estimate of 
 Shakspere. 
 
 1607. Shakspere's daughter Susanna married Dr. Hall. 
 
 1608. Mary Shakspere died. 
 
 1609. Sonnets published. 
 
 1610. Histrio mastix ; or, the Player Whipt. 
 
 1612. Apology for Actors, by Thomas Heywood, is printed. 
 
 161 3. Globe Theatre burnt during performance of Henry VIII. 
 
 16 14. Shakspere, according to contemporary testimony, expressed 
 
 a strong repugnance to the enclosure of common lands 
 near Stratford. 
 
 1614. Great fire at Stratford. 
 
 1615. Greene's Refutation of the " Apology for Actors." 
 
 161 6. Shakspere's daughter Judith married Richard Quiney. 
 
 1616. Jonson at Stratford. Shakspere died. 
 
 1 616. All Jonson's papers burned, and probably some of Shak- 
 
 spere's, in London. Fire at Stratford. 
 
 1623. Shakspere's wife, Anne Hathaway, died. Heming and 
 
 Condell brought out his collected works. 
 
 1642. Edict against plays. 
 
 1660. Restoration. 
 
 CONTEMPORARY BIOGRAPHICAL DATES. 
 
 1536-1608. Thomas Sackville, Lord Buckhurst, and Earl of Dorset 
 (dramatic poet). 
 
 I 55 2-I 596- George Peele (dramatic poet). 
 
 1 552-16 18. Sir Walter Raleigh (poet and historian).
 
 SOME INTRODUCTORY DATES. xiii 
 
 1 553-1 599. Edmund Spenser (poet). 
 
 1 554-1601. John Lyly (dramatic poet, and author of Euphues Anatomy 
 of Wit, 1569 ; Euphues, Jiis England, 15S2). 
 
 1 554-1586. Sir Philip Sydney (soldier, poet, and author of the Arcadia 
 and Sonnets and Apologie for Poetrie). 
 
 1 5 54-1 628. Fulke Greville, Lord Brooke (philosophic poet). 
 
 1 556-1625. Thomas Lodge (dramati.st and prose-writer). 
 
 1557-1634. George Chapman (dramatic poet, translator). 
 
 1558-1609. William Warner (author of Albion's England, historical 
 
 poem). 
 1 560- 1 592. Robert Greene (dramatist and pamphleteer). 
 1561-1612. Sir John Harrington : his translation of Ariosto published 
 
 I59I- 
 1561-1626. Francis Bacon, Lord Verulam, Viscount St. Alban 
 
 (philosopher, historian, &c). 
 
 1 562-1619. Samuel Daniel (poet). 
 
 1 562-1 593. Christopher Marlowe (dramatist and poet). 
 
 1563-1618. John Davies of Hereford (poet). 
 
 1563-1631. Michael Drayton (poet, author of Polyolhion). 
 
 1563-1618. Joshua Sylvester (translator of Du Bartas' Divine Weeks 
 and Works). 
 
 1 564-1616. William Shakspere. 
 
 1 567-1600. Thomas Nash (dramatist and pamphleteer). 
 
 1 568-1639. Sir Henry Wotton (essayist and poet). 
 
 1 569-1640. John Webster (dramatic poet). 
 
 1569-1626. Sir John Davies (philosophic poet). 
 
 1570-1632. Edward Fairfax : published his version of Tasso, 1600. 
 
 1 573-1631. Dr. John Donne (poet and preacher). 
 
 1 574-1626. Richard Barnefield (poet). 
 
 1 574-1637. Ben Jonson (dramatist, poet, and critic). 
 
 1 575-1634. John Marston (dramatist). 
 
 1 576-1625. John Fletcher (dramatist and poet). 
 
 1586-1615. Francis Beaumont (dramatist and poet).
 
 xiv SOME INTRODUCTORY DATES. 
 
 CONTEMPORARY MINOR DRAMATISTS. 
 
 Henry Chettle. Thomas Nabbes. 
 
 Thomas Dekker. William Rowley. 
 
 John Day. Robert Taylor. 
 
 Thomas Middleton. Cyril Tourneur. 
 
 William Haughton.
 
 THE 
 
 BACON -SHAKSPERE QUESTION 
 
 ANSWERED. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 
 
 The Bacon- Shakspere theory in one way benefits literary 
 students. The opportunity of studying, on parallel lines of 
 date and action, the lives of the two greatest writers of the 
 greatest period of English literature is too good to be lost. 
 The Baconian theory acts as a filum labyrinthi in the mass 
 of materials of the period, and much matter that might 
 otherwise be passed as unimportant is carefully sifted in 
 reviewing what has come down to us from a Past that was 
 once a Present. 
 
 The proceedings of the Bacon Society tell us, "The con- 
 tention of the Baconians is that William Shakspere had 
 no hand whatever in the production of either the plays or 
 the poems — that he was an uneducated man, who could 
 just manage to write his own name ; that there is not a 
 particle of evidence that he ever wrote, or could write, any- 
 thing else." They also accuse him of every sin and crime, 
 short of murder, to take away his character, and thus argue 
 from his want of character an incapacity to have produced 
 his poems. It is reasoning in a circle with a vengeance, 
 when the argumentum ad hommem is thus made to contra- 
 dict the argumentum ad rem. The personal animus shown 
 in the way their proofs are presented, discounts from the
 
 2 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 validity of their conclusions. The Baconians are unwise, 
 they try to prove too much. They say Shakspere was 
 utterly illiterate and unahle to write any of his works. If 
 I can only prove he wrote " some," or even that he was 
 capable of writing " any," I can prove their universal asser- 
 tion false by a particular. 
 
 I cannot imagine any literary student asserting Bacon's 
 claim. I cannot imagine a psychologic student believing 
 in its possibility. As Dr. Furnivall said, " Some men are 
 born colour-blind, and cannot distinguish tints ; those must 
 be born character-blind that cannot distinguish Bacon from 
 Shakspere." 
 
 I may divide my answers into four groups. 
 
 ist. The probabilities from known character and educa- 
 tion of the writer of the plays. 
 
 2nd. Internal evidence, gained by comparing Shakspere's 
 plays and the works of Bacon, and referring each to the 
 character of the ascribed author and supposed author. 
 
 3rd. The external evidence of most of the poems and 
 plays being at some time claimed by Shakspere, and nevt r 
 by Bacon. 
 
 4th. The external evidence of the writings of contem- 
 poraries, some of whom personally knew both these great 
 men. 
 
 The question is too large to be discussed fully in these 
 pages, yet I must briefly consider each of these four 
 divisions, introducing specially as a novel illustration the 
 differing views of the two writers regarding stimulants. 
 Afterwards I shall notice briefly the history of the heresy, 
 and one or two particular contradictions.
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE PROBABILITIES FROM KNOWN CHARACTER AND 
 EDUCATION OF THE WRITER OF THE PLAYS. 
 
 The probabilities from character and education are those 
 that the Baconians specially present to us in favour of their 
 theory ; so it is well to consider this point first. 
 
 The psychologic aspect is of prime importance in such a 
 discussion, but the historical is a part of the psychological. 
 All minds live and learn through environments ; all are, to 
 a certain extent, moulded by circumstances. 
 
 The first question naturally to be considered is the birth- 
 place of an individual. William Shakspere was not born 
 in London, it is true, but probably he was born in a more 
 favourable nursery for poets than York House, Strand. 
 
 Warwickshire belonged to the province Flavia Csesari- 
 ensis. It is a central county ; the great Roman roads from 
 Dover to Chester and from Totnes to Lincoln met there, 
 so that much traffic and interchange of ideas must have 
 sharpened the natives, from the times of the Romans on 
 into the sixteenth century. In Saxon times it was the 
 district of Mercia, whither King Alfred sent for scholars, 
 and which gave the literary language to later England. 
 This pre-eminence it had not lost. Bacon, in his Jewel 
 of Joy, dedicated in 1549 to the Princess Elizabeth, speaks 
 of it as the most intellectual of the English counties. 1 
 
 1 See Appendix, Note 1.
 
 4 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Drayton speaks of it as "warlike Warwickshire." It 
 was the border-land between the Celtic and Teutonic races. 
 Shakspere is the type Englishman who has, as Green says, 
 " combined the mobility and fancy of the Celt with the 
 depth and energy of the Teuton," and the place of his birth 
 must not be ignored. By the River Avon it was divided 
 into " Arden," a part of the primeval forest in the north- 
 west, and Felldon in the south-east, where hills, dales, clear- 
 ings, woods, and fields alternated. The whole neighbourhood 
 was haunted by suggestions ; subjects for romance floated 
 in the very atmosphere. 1 
 
 Guy of Warwick 2 and Heraud of Arden formerly roamed 
 there. Evesham and Bosworth were fought on the borders 
 of the shire. Layamon and Piers Ploughman and Wycliffe 
 were writers of the district. Henry VII. had slept in 
 Coventry, where the old " Mysteries" lingered until Shak- 
 spere 's youth, and the pageants of Kenil worth (1575) were 
 among the most magnificent in Elizabeth's royal pro- 
 gresses. 
 
 The address presented to Elizabeth on coming to Warwick 
 in 1572 gives the histoiy of the shire under the Britons 
 and Saxons. The Black Book of Warwick contains an 
 account of the celebration of the Order of St. Michael (157 1) 
 by Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, at St. Mary's Church 
 in Warwick ; and an account of the magnificent funeral of 
 the Earl of Northampton in 1571 at Warwick. Though 
 the young Shakspere may not have seen these pageants, 
 he must have heard of them. 
 
 1 John Rous, our earliest antiquary, in the reign of Edward IV. writes 
 the Antiquities of Warwick, of which Dugdale makes much use in his 
 Warwickshire, 1644. 
 
 2 In the Gesta Iiomanorum is the story of Guy of Warwick return- 
 inf from Palestine to a hermit's cell near Warwick, and receiving alms 
 for three days from his lady without her recognising him. 
 
 " Guy of Warwick, I understand, 
 Slew a dragon in Northumberland." 
 He also fought Collbrun, the Danish giant. — Legend of Guy of Warwick.
 
 PROBABILITIES. 5 
 
 Jean Paul Richter said that every poet ought to choose to 
 have himself born in a small town, so as to grow up having 
 the advantages of town and country life. This happened 
 in Shakspere's case, and every other condition known of his 
 life is essentially congruous with the idea of a poet's de- 
 velopment. Stratford was no inconsiderable town. It was 
 of old foundation, having a history that led back to Roman 
 times. In Shakspere's early life it was prospering, in com- 
 mon with the rest of the kingdom, under Elizabeth. Camden 
 calls it "emporiolum non inelegans." In Speede's county 
 map of England, 1610, 1 we find it marked as of the same size 
 and importance as Warwick, and second only to Coventry 
 in the county. It possessed the first highway bridge over 
 the Avon below Warwick, and much traffic must therefore 
 have passed through it. It had a handsome church ; liberal 
 feast-days ; an annual fair ; frequent visits from the Earl of 
 Leicester's and other companies of players ; a good grammar- 
 school, and a town-council intelligent enough to know the 
 value of written records, and to preserve them. 
 
 The scenery was sweet rather than majestic, yet varied 
 sufficiently, within the stretches of a young man's ride, for 
 all the inland suggestions of the scenery of the plays ; for 
 the foliage, the flowers, the heaths. For the town lay just 
 by the fair Forest of Arden, 2 placed on the sweet Avon, 
 whose banks, with their " hoar willows," their " footpath 
 way," their stiles, their merry knaves, are often suggested 
 in his plays. 
 
 1 See Appendix, Note 2. 
 
 2 << Where nightingales in Arden sit and sing 
 
 Amongst the dainty dew-empearled flowers." — DEATTON. 
 " Muse, first of Arden tell, whose footsteps yet are found 
 In her rough woodlands more than any other ground, 
 That mighty Arden held, even in her height of pride, 
 Her one hand touching Trent, the other Severn's Bide." 
 
 — Drayton's Poly oil ion.
 
 6 THE BACONSHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Shakspere was born of one of the best families within 
 that town. 1 His father had passed through the various 
 grades of municipal dignity, having been successively Ale- 
 taster, one of the four Constables, one of the four Affeerors, 
 then High Alderman or Bailiff of Stratford, and that more 
 than once, until 1586; and a sense of importance and general 
 interest must have risen in his house. He was evidently 
 much respected ; even the old records give witness of that ; 
 and he must have met the best society to be had. 2 His 
 wife, an heiress of the neighbouring old family of Arden, of 
 good connections, was a great "gift from God" to him. Well- 
 endowed and capable; probably handsome, 3 and certainly 
 affectionate ; she gave her husband a chance in life such as 
 few of his townsfolk had. No doubt she cherished the 
 memories of her old family, that went back into warlike 
 Saxon times ; even though her branch of it had ended 
 among seven distaffs. 4 
 
 On many winter nights she would doubtless pour into 
 the youthful ears of her children the family and local 
 legends (for tradition in those days took the place of much 
 of our modern education), and would connect the present 
 with the past. A sense of the romance of war and a dream 
 of the pomp of courts would thus arise in young Shak- 
 spere's heart. We can see how he would appreciate the 
 martial suggestion in his patronymic, so much made of by 
 his contemporaries. 5 
 
 1 See Appendix, Note 3. 2 See Appendix, Note 4. 
 
 3 Oldys says Mary Arden was beautiful. 
 
 4 There is an old superstition about the seventh child of the same sex 
 having a " seer's eye." Mayhap, Mary had just enough of it to transfer 
 it to her heir. 
 
 5 A record of the name appears in Kent in 1279: "Some are 
 named from that they carried, as Palmer, . . . Long-sword, Broad- 
 spear, and, in some respect, Shakespeare." — Camden's Iiemaincs, ed. 
 1605. 
 
 " Breakspear, Shakspear, and the like, have bin surnames imposed
 
 PROBABILITIES. 7 
 
 Though his father seems to have had at least little skill 
 with the pen, William would certainly get the best oppor- 
 tunities of education the place could afford. Nine years 
 before his birth, King Edward VI. specially interested 
 himself in the re-establishment by royal charter of the 
 Free Grammar-School of Stratford, which had been sup- 
 pressed at the dissolution of the religious houses in his 
 father's reign. The head-master had ^"20 a year at the 
 time the master of Eton had but ^10 a year. It may 
 be supposed that he was at least rather above the average, 
 and that his school was relatively a good one. Mr. Baynes * 
 gives a list of the books used there. But I imagine that to 
 this list should be added Thomas Wilson's Art of Rhetoric, 
 which was dedicated in 1557 to the Earl of Warwick, to 
 whom Stratford belonged, and would very naturally be 
 introduced here. Not only does he explain how " three 
 things are required of an orator, to teache, to delight, and 
 to persuade;" but the foundation of Iago's speech, which 
 the Baconians insist is from untranslated Berni, is found 
 therein. Herein also is an epistle devised by Erasmus in 
 behalf of his friend, to persuade a young gentleman to 
 marry, that suggests passages in the Sonnets. William 
 must have learned something at school. No doubt he 
 often was dreaming and indolent, he had so many interests. 
 He might remember himself when he wrote of the " school- 
 boy creeping unwillingly to school," or playing truant, 
 from facts to weave his fancies, " of imagination all com- 
 pact." The old chap-books and romances must have floated 
 many a time between the pages of his Latin Grammar and 
 his eyes. Tho river, the stile-paths, the woods, the wild 
 
 upon the first bearers of them for valour and feates of armes." — Ycr- 
 stegcn's Restitution of Decayed Intelligence, ed. 1605. 
 
 In Polydoron (undated) : " Names were first questionlesse given for 
 distinction, facultie, consanguinity, desert, quality, . . . as Armstrong. 
 Shakspeare of high quality." 
 
 1 Appendix, Note 2.
 
 8 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 flowers, the clouds, and the'Joirds must have been an early 
 attraction to the natural poet-soul. 
 
 Doubtless the temptations of beautiful Mother Nature 
 were often too much for him, and he would rush off from 
 the chattering town to the sweet solemn silences of the 
 Forest of Arden, thinking, " I know a bank whereon the 
 wild thyme blows;" and perhaps he would dream there till 
 he saw the Fairy Queen as evening fell, and was sworn 
 into her service like Thomas of Ercildoune. 
 
 It was all so natural, further, for one like him to have 
 merry times with young fellows as he grew older, and to 
 play big schoolboy pranks on Sir Thomas Lucy and his 
 keepers. We cannot but think there must have been some 
 foundation for the legend of deer-stealing. It was a part 
 of the romance of youth to re-enact the legends of the 
 past. The old literature of the time shows that " to have 
 a buck '"' was to win a feather in one's cap. The law of the 
 time ' proves that no dreadful consequences would have 
 ensued on such a deed, even if Lucy had wished to enforce 
 them, which would not have been likely had the culprit 
 been a child of his old neighbour, Mary Arden, and of his 
 old fellow Justice of the Peace, John Shakspere. Besides, 
 a conclusive evidence of its haziness lies in the fact that 
 Lucy was preparing to be member of Parliament for the 
 county of Warwick, for which he was returned in 1584. 
 
 I do not think that Shakspere meant all the satire in 
 Justice Shallow for Lucy. There must have been many 
 another "Justice of the Peace" familiar to him, whose 
 peculiarities would be more original than those of a culti- 
 
 1 The "penalties" were only attached to poaching on the royal 
 parks. For taking a deer from an "enclosed park," a man was liable 
 to pay three times its price, or, in default, to remain in prison for three 
 months. But the park from which Shakspere was said to have taken 
 the deer, Fulbrooke, was not enclosed. It was sequestrated, and lay 
 next to that <>f Sir Thomas Lucy, whose park also had not been 
 "licensed" at the date necessary to make penalties legal.
 
 PROBABILITIES. 9 
 
 vated man like Sir Thomas. 1 But a little irritation is 
 displayed. My own opinion is that Lucy had withdrawn 
 from intimacy with the family at the time of its waning 
 fortunes, and roused a bitter feeling thus in the eldest 
 son's heart, which afterwards expressed itself in Timon. 
 But it was not Sir Thomas Lucy that drove Shakspere 
 from Stratford. 
 
 His over-early and impetuous love, suddenly sobered by 
 a hasty marriage, suggests many a poetic thought in his 
 love scenes. But it was his too rapid awakening to the 
 responsibilities of paternity that changed the current of his 
 life. His father had a large family to support upon the 
 lands, and the trade slipping from him; and more than 
 enough domestic help to perform the various employments 
 that farmers combined in those days before the division-of- 
 labour system had arisen. Times or people had changed, 
 and the fortunes of the family had grown darkest just 
 before a new dawn. 2 Its eldest -born son rose to the 
 emergency. His mother's inheritance, that should have 
 been his own, had gone at great disadvantage in times 
 of sore pressure. The Henley Street house was retained, 
 but anxious thoughts must have often darkened it, how to 
 keep the wolf from the door. There is no doubt that the 
 money difficulties of that period acted as a peculiar, and 
 perhaps necessary, training for the free poet-soul, and 
 were the real cause of his after industry and worldly 
 success. When, in the midst of his father's money 
 anxieties (that he evidently sympathised in), he coinpli- 
 
 1 Mr. Halliwell has unearthed the strange fact that Sir Thomas 
 Lucy himself, supposed to be so Puritanic, was a patron of players, as 
 he found in a record of the Chamberlain's accounts in Coventry, 1584 : 
 "To Sir Thomas Lucy's plaiers, x. s." If so different in one respect 
 from his received character, he may also be in another. 
 
 2 There is a complaint that " for want of such trade as heretofore 
 they had by clothing and making of yarn," the town had become less 
 prosperous than formerly at this time,
 
 io THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 cated matters by marrying Anne Hathaway before he 
 could support her, he had met the crisis of his life. 
 
 " Love is too young to know what conscience is : 
 Yet who knows not conscience is born of love." 
 
 After that he certainly felt that he must give up his future 
 life to duty. That he had power to combine two dis- 
 similar aims, and succeed in both, showed no common 
 mind. In choosing a career, he allowed his inclinations 
 some play; buckled on his knapsack, and, like many 
 another man, went to seek his fortune in London, and 
 found it. He went not unknown. His mother had good 
 friends, his father many acquaintances ; there were many 
 Stratford men in London ; I find about a dozen in the 
 Stationers' records ; but it is more than likely he went 
 straight to his old school-fellow Field, who was a printer 
 in Blackfriars. In Blackfriars also were the players that 
 had been often down in Stratford, Warwickshire men also, 
 Burbage among them. To them would he go, possibly witli 
 the rough scroll of Venus and Adonis, the "first heir of his 
 invention," in his pocket. If he went to London in 1586, 
 as some think, it may only have been as a visit, for he 
 must have returned to Stratford in 1587, as he then con- 
 curred with his parents in giving up his right to inheri- 
 tance in Asbies, that they might mortgage it further to 
 Lambert, for an additional sum of ^20. l 
 
 Several companies of players were in Stratford in 1587, 
 and it is more than likely he went to London along with 
 them, and engaged to them. His father had always been 
 fond of spectacle, had been kind to the players in the day 
 of his power, and they, more than likely, had a kindly feel- 
 ing towards the young Benedict of their own neighbourhood, 
 on whom the cares of domestic life were now pressing so 
 heavily. For there is no doubt his parents and younger 
 
 1 See Appendix, Note 5.
 
 PROBABILITIES. n 
 
 brethren leaned on him, as well as Anne and his three 
 children. His player-friends could not help him outside 
 of their own circle ; but they did what they could for him, 
 and took him into their company to train. This training 
 would necessitate a thorough understanding of all the 
 various responsibilities in the theatre, from the taking of 
 the money at the door to arranging the seats and dresses. 
 
 He was young, handsome, healthy, and ambitious, a 
 charming companion, a versatile genius. They very soon 
 discovered his gifts, and taught him to act. Burbage 
 wanted a young leading actor, and he filled the post awhile, 
 acting Romeos. Seeing his power in impromptu, they set 
 him to alter and freshen up some of their old stock of 
 plays. His success in that department kindled him to 
 spend his powers on original work, and in a few years he 
 was famous ; how few relatively may be calculated, by 
 comparing with his, the number of years it generally takes 
 a poet to get written about by other poets or by professors 
 of literature. The universality of his genius, his range of 
 thought, his congruity of diction and sweetness of versifi- 
 cation, must have been fed by a wonderful power of obser- 
 vation and retentive force of memory. His mind seemed 
 like a magnet, that drew all grains of iron to itself, and im- 
 pressed its power on what it drew. 
 
 Just think how rapidly he would develope then. Trans- 
 planted from the centre of a small town, where every one 
 knew him, to the fringes of a great city unknown to him, 
 the unknown ; how small the unit to him would seem before 
 the mass of humanity. Instead of the Coventry Mysteries 
 of his boyhood, and the travelling players of his youth, he 
 would see in the best theatres the best plays of the time. 1 
 At first a critical spectator, he entered behind the scenes. 
 The stage becomes a different thing when one treads it; 
 life is a different thing when seen from behind the foot- 
 
 1 See Appendix, Xote 6.
 
 12 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 lights. The people would become the actors to him, and 
 he learned their ways by heart. He was endowed with a 
 determination to make the best possible of every oppor- 
 tunity. Among the stage-properties would be a large stock 
 of manuscript and printed plays, accepted and rejected. We 
 must remember that the Drama was but a modern revival. 
 It was then about fifty years old. Dr. Palsgrave's play of 
 Acolastus was printed 1529. Heywood's Plays appeai-ed in 
 1533. Sackville's Ferrex and Porrex, 1554, had initiated 
 Tragedy and blank verse; and Nicholas Udall's Ralph 
 Roister Doisler 1 had led off true Comedy (1553) in a rapid 
 transition from the old Mysteries, and Gammer GurtorCs 
 Needle had followed it in 1575. By 1580 the form of art 
 had taken shape. Every writer was bound to be original 
 then, for the very form of art was original to the period. 
 How eagerly he would pore over the ripening powers of 
 Lily, Greene, Peele, Marlowe, Kyd, and Lodge, with a pre- 
 liminary rapture that kindled his own soul ! 
 
 Marlowe was the one that most affected him, the only 
 one he definitely quoted, after his death saying — 
 
 " Dead Shepherd, now we know thy spell of night : 
 Who ever loved that loved not at first sight ? " — 
 
 the one who finally introduced blank verse, and wrote to 
 free the stage 
 
 " From jigging veins of rhyming mother wits, 
 And such conceits as clownage keeps in pay." 
 
 Shakspere absorbed " Marlowe's mighty line," while 
 
 1 Holder Bolster, written and probably acted before 1553 by Nicholas 
 Udall, Master of Eton (with a salary of £10), afterwards Rector of 
 Braintree, Prebend of Windsor, Hector of Calborne, and Master of 
 Westminster Grammar-School. The two first lines, spoken by Matthew 
 Merygreeke, remind one of Autolycus : — 
 
 " As long lyveth the mcry man (the}- say) 
 As doth the sory man, and longer by a day."
 
 PROBABILITIES. 13 
 
 Nash called Tamburlaine "the swelling bombast of a 
 brasreinar blank verse." Thus the determination of his 
 poetic form he owed to his worldly success as well as his 
 worldly misfortunes. The Venus and Adonis and Lucrece 
 showed what he would have done had he been free to 
 develope his poetic nature in what was then considered the 
 higher forms of pure poetry. But he was not free. He 
 would neither beg nor starve. He had to make money for 
 his family, and support them decently. He threw the 
 whole of his energy into his present duty, so as to benefit 
 his partners as well as himself. Doubtless, also, dreams 
 of redeeming his lost inheritance of Asbies glorified his 
 then unhonoured toil, and the proud consciousness of 
 making the best of a life that had its difficulties. And he 
 succeeded in it, from every aspect. 
 
 The litigation 1 between Burbage's sons and other in- 
 tending partners shows the true meanings of Greene's 
 jealousy of him, and of the ruling power he had acquired 
 in the short space of five years. 
 
 We must not imagine the young rustic hemmed in the 
 heart of London as it is now. Gerard was at this time pre- 
 
 1 1635: A collection of papers relating to shares and sharers in the 
 Globe and Blackfriars Theatres, preserved among the official manu- 
 scripts of the Lord Chamberlain at St. James's Palace. Benefield, 
 Swanstown, and Pollard appealed to be allowed to buy a share in 
 these : Cuthbert Burbage, and Winifred, his brother's wife, and 
 William, his son, petitioned "not to be disabled of our livelihoods by 
 men so soon shot up, since it hath been the custom that they should 
 come to it by far more antiquity and desert than these can justly 
 attribute to themselves. . . . The father of us, Cuthbert and Richard 
 Burbage, was the first builder of playhouses, and was himself in his 
 younger years a player. The theatre he built with many hundred 
 pounds taken up at interest . . . and at like expense built the Globe, 
 with more summes taken up at interest : and to ourselves we joined 
 those deserving men, Shakspere, Hemings, Condell, Philipps, and othi rs, 
 partners in the profittes of that they called the house. . . . Now for the 
 Blackfriars, that is our inheritance ; our father purchased it at extreme 
 rates, and made it into a playhouse with great charge and trouble, . . . 
 and placed men players, which were Hemings, Condell, Shakspere, &c.'
 
 I 4 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 paring his Historie of Plants, 1 and we can there leai'n how 
 easily a strong-limbed youth could reach fields and bushes, 
 heaths and ditches, flowers and trees. No doubt he had 
 many a lonely walk to solace and inspire him. 
 
 But that was his relaxation. There was other work to 
 do. He had much to read. Many have asked where is 
 Shakspere's library ? I think that beyond the books of his 
 boyhood and the " properties " of the theatre, there is so 
 strange a connection between his knowledge and the publi- 
 cations of Yautrollier and Field, that we must consider a 
 probability that he derived his information direct from 
 them. A bookseller's shop of the period would supply the 
 place of the library of to-day. It would be so natural that 
 Shakspere should have the " freedom of the press " there. 
 We can well imagine his first period in London, spent in 
 sharing even the same room with Field, eagerly reading the 
 books thus naturally brought within his reach, and filling 
 up the gaps in his education with an interest that no 
 scholastic method could have done. Perhaps even, as Mr. 
 Blades suggests, with arguments more forcible than are 
 brought forward to prove Shakspere belonging to any other 
 profession, he might have learned type-setting and proof- 
 correcting then, as there are in his works so many phrases 
 that, to a printer's eye, intimate special knowledge of his 
 trade. Mr. Halliwell-Phillips suggests that he must, at 
 least, have gone carefully over his dedicated poems, as the 
 title-page and the typography are so superior to anything else 
 of the time. At least it was certain Shakspere knew Field, 
 and he could not know any man without learning something 
 from him. I give a list and some particulars in the notes - 
 for our special purpose. The titles even of their books are 
 most suggestive. Greene's Novels, Lyly's Exphues, Sydney's 
 Arcadia, Spenser's Faery Queene, were of course in every 
 one's hands, as well as Chaucer and Gower. 
 
 1 See Appendix, IN'ote 7. - See Appendix, Note
 
 PROBABILITIES. i; 
 
 I believe that he also had the volume of Montaigne's 
 Essays that contains his name. 1 This was translated by 
 Florio, who taught the French and Italian languages, and 
 lived in the pay of the Earl of Southampton, whom he 
 called the " pearl of peers." From this connection he pro- 
 bably knew Shakspere, and might have himself given him 
 this copy of Montaigne's Essays. It is evident he had read 
 them, as he frankly borrows much from them, especially in 
 the Tempest. Other books in existence are said to have 
 belonged to Shakspere, but one cannot prove anything by 
 tradition alone. 
 
 But the plays are not the work of a mere student. 
 
 His onlv son died in 1596, and for his sake the heart- 
 wrung father calls boys always " sweet." As the years pass 
 on. and young sisters and brothers, and old grandfather, 
 father and uncles die, he is impressed with the certainties 
 and uncertainties of that " undiscovered bourne, from which 
 no traveller ever returns." 
 
 His company meanwhile had their annual tours, and 
 probably he went with them over the face of the country. - 
 Mr. Halliwell's superhuman industry has already unearthed 
 from various registers the dates of payments to them for 
 playing in Coventry, Dover, Faversham, Barnstaple, Bath, 
 Bristol, Oxford, Rye, Saffron-Walden, Shrewsbury, Folke- 
 stone, Leicester, Marlborough, New Komney ; and many 
 
 1 Montaigne"s Essays, written 15S0, were translated by Florio, and 
 published 1603. He dedicated each of its three parts to two noble 
 ladies, the second part to Lady Rich— Sidney's Stella and the " Dark 
 Ladye " of the Sonnets. 
 
 The authenticity of the autograph of Shakspere has been dis- 
 puted, though not disproved. But the writing might have been 
 Southampton's or Florio's, or his publishers on giving the book to 
 Shakspere. The signature was extant before the forging sugges- 
 tions of Ireland, having in 17S0 belonged to the Rev. Edward Patte- 
 son of Smethwick in Staffordshire, about three miles from Birmingham 
 and near Stratford, and was shown as a great curiosity by his father 
 to his literary friends. 
 
 - See Halliwell's Shakespeare's Tours.
 
 ... 
 
 ■■■■■ - . '.".•-;• \:. .:,:. ';-.-:.-. : 
 
 -, -,z::.: .. 
 
 ....:: .--.-. . ■.-- - 
 
 ■'/■■' '■■■■■'■■ •' :*'--"" ::.'.. .:.:. ■-.:. : ...:r,.;- L.-.-.zL"^- 
 
 :■'....:■. 
 
 Heneems 
 
 ■ 
 bat .:.: . 
 
 . _ . 
 
 - 
 
 ■ . . . . .. . 
 
 - 
 ■ 
 
 - 
 
 - 
 
 ■ 
 
 - . 
 i 
 - 
 : . 
 
 ...
 
 PROBABILITIES. : - 
 
 Pastoral 
 
 I ■-.: - - tenon the sea or -. ::le- 
 
 ion. A n 
 
 - . inland 
 -.ared and i : Jm of r 
 
 ar. 
 
 Bat Arcadianism and 
 
 e Moral gedy 
 
 fcion .. t of 
 
 - e people. ":. : - g Eke i I fa 
 
 in him. N ias 
 . ■ . • ^ome £. 
 
 Manypoe:- 
 
 i: given 1 
 
 ■ -'-"' I ran to a g to i 
 
 trc.- rm. 
 
 - Words- 
 
 rth had . .n; 
 
 his humour, his 
 ehi" :.nd 
 
 iesixe 1 1 
 
 I in purchasing pro- 
 per by in £ -' Ere 
 
 I the 
 ing his - : arms for 
 
 . - 
 
 : •. ■ . - — 
 
 ] 
 
 ".' 
 wealtk '■ .. vemvott.: 
 
 .ap. ii. 
 -..-. -:l:.-. .■- ':-' : -: - -• - "■■ -- - ■ -- - ------ t e -i • .:' the realm 
 
 -
 
 iS THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 from business. 1 Buying, improving, lending, giving; act- 
 ing as the head of the whole family, the benefactor of the 
 whole town. 
 
 A letter from Abraham Sturley to his brother-in-law 
 Richard Quiney has been preserved : — " It seemeth by your 
 father that our countryman Mr. Shakespeare is willing to 
 disburse some money. . . . Move him to deal in the matter 
 of our tithes. By the instructions you can give him there- 
 of, and by the friends he can make therefore. ... It 
 obtained would advance him indeed, and would do us much 
 good.'" "Moved" by this friend, he did buy the half of 
 the great tithes and the small tithes. He looked ever 
 towards the home of his youth as the retreat of bis age. 
 With poets his friends to the last, loved by his relatives, 
 honoured by his native city, he died, when he had " lived 
 long enough." 
 
 How different was Bacon, full of ambitions, with no im- 
 mediate personal duty to others to raise or purify them. 
 Essentially a city youth, a University student, a classic 
 critic, an observant traveller, a man of the world, a states- 
 man born and bred, a lawyer, a member of Parliament, an 
 Attorney-General, a Lord Chancellor, an essayist, a scientist, 
 a philosopher — above all, the author of "The greatest birth 
 of Time." 2 
 
 That was his secret work, the idea of his life, his happi- 
 ness, his hope, his Alpha and Omega. All other work has 
 meaning only in relation to this. His virtue was centred 
 in it. It was a great idea, greatly planned, and some of it 
 greatly performed. Probably for the sake of his experi- 
 ments, he was continually in debt, and thought it no dis- 
 
 beare the port, charge, and countenance of a gentleman, he shall be 
 called Master, for that is the title men give to Esquires and other 
 gentlemen ; and shall be taken for a gentleman." 
 
 This appears before Shakspere's application for arms, but illus- 
 trates it. 
 
 : Appendix, Note 9. - Appendix, Note 10.
 
 PROBABILITIES. 
 
 19 
 
 & 
 
 grace to allow his mother and brother to pinch themselves 
 for him. Yet it was not a poetic conception. His faults 
 were essentially unpoetic. His character was selfish and 
 self-centred ; he never did an impulsive thing in his life. 
 He fell in love at forty-three, and married at forty-six 
 a young and eligible maiden ; did not make her happy, and 
 was not very happy with her himself. A hunter for place 
 and reward all his life, he plied his sovereign with petitions, 
 and beside his sovereign, all his sovereign's favourites. He 
 might have loved Essex in his own way, but he deserted 
 him ; he could not have honoured James and Yilliers, but 
 he loaded them with adulation. When charged with the 
 interrogatory of Peacham before, during, and after torture, 
 he did not appeal to the King's heart with " the quality 
 of mercy," but took it quite easily. 
 
 During the time of the Plague in 1592, flying to Twick- 
 enham, at the time the Venus and Adonis must have 
 been in preparation, he wrote Mr. Bacon in Praise of 
 Knowledge, and Mr. Bacon in Praise of his Sovereign, parts 
 of the device of the Earl of Essex, called the Conference of 
 Pleasure. This was was his " invention." For solid work 
 that year he was writing his Observations on a Libel. 
 
 In 1593, when Lucrece must have been in process of 
 development, he was in Parliament, speaking eloquently 
 on the question of supplies, and in one way offending the 
 Queen, while he amused her with his sharp retorts on the 
 other. He was thirty-three then, and he had settled to 
 nothing. His tastes and desires were at war. Thomas 
 a Kempis says, " The more a man is united within himself 
 and interiorly simple, the more he will succeed in his aim." 
 Bacon was not united within himself ; he was interiorly 
 complex. 
 
 In 1594, the year of the publication of Lucrece, appeared 
 his first political production, A Declaration of the Causes 
 of the Great Troubles. He also wrote a letter to Essex 
 when discouraged by the Queen's delays : " My nature can 
 
 B
 
 20 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 take no evil ply, but I will by God's assistance with this 
 disgrace of my fortune, and yet with that comfort of the 
 good opinion of so many honourable and worthy persons, 
 retire myself with a couple of men to Cambridge, and there 
 spend my life in my studies, without looking back." It 
 is a pity he did not. The great scheme might have been 
 completed then, and possibly an autobiography produced 
 that would have set this and many other knotty questions 
 at rest. 
 
 In 1597, in the same year as Romeo and Juliet, the 
 quintessence of Love apart from circumstance, appeared 
 his Essays, among which is his essay on " Love." " A 
 man must be of a very serious nature to think love a 
 serious matter." He can analyse the elements of love; 
 neither in life nor in writing did he acknowledge its power. 
 " Great spirits and great business do keep out this weak 
 passion." Much sympathy has been felt for him by some 
 on account of his refusal by Lady Hatton, and his morti- 
 fication that his rival should win her. It is probable she 
 had wisely compared his professions with his publications, 
 and had decided accordingly. He evidently suffered more 
 from the loss of her money than of her affection. I cannot 
 imagine him much regretting his single state. In his 
 essay on Marriage and a Single Life he says, " Certainly 
 the best works, and of greatest merit for the public, have 
 proceeded from the unmarried or childless man." He ap- 
 proves of the saying of Thales, who, when asked when a 
 man should marry, answered, " A young man not yet ; an 
 elder man not at all." 
 
 HisWisdom of the Ancients appeared in the year of Troilus 
 and Cressida ; and he was preparing his great work for 
 the press in the year of the folio edition of the Plays, in 
 1623, about which so much has been said, and in the year 
 following (1624) his metrical translation of the Psalms. 
 
 Meanwhile, as his life showed no passion, no self-sacri- 
 fice, no devotion of any kind, neither did it show the manly
 
 PROBABILITIES. 21 
 
 pride of the poet. Begging, praying, petitioning, he can 
 have had no time for content or happiness. Though lavish, 
 he was not generous ; though magnificent, he was not vir- 
 tuous. His genius is that of a man of science. 
 
 He distinctly states what he would do if left to himself : 
 " The call for me, it is book-learning." I confess I have as 
 vast contemplative ends as I have moderate civil ones." 
 " I am like ground fresh. If I be left to myself, I will 
 grow and bear natural philosophy ; but if the King will 
 plow me up again and sow me on, I hope to give him some 
 yield. ... If active, I should write — 
 
 1. The Reconciling of Laws. 
 
 2. The Disposing of Wards. 
 
 3. Limiting the Jurisdiction of Courts. 
 
 If contemplative, I would write — 
 
 1. Going on with the story of Henry VIII. 
 
 2. General treatise of De Legibus et Justitia. 
 
 3. The Holy War." 
 
 Writing to Sir Thomas Bodley, he says : " Therefore 
 calling myself home, I have now for a time enjoyed myself, 
 whereof likewise I desire to make the world partake. My 
 labours, if I may so term that which was the comfort of 
 my other labours, I have dedicated to the King." And 
 this was Cogitata et Visa — i.e., philosophical writings — no 
 claim for poetry. 
 
 His tremendous energy and perseverance are worthy of 
 note. From sixteen to sixty he kept making experiments 
 and inventions, studying philosophy, noting facts, writing 
 and rewriting his marvellous collection of philosophic works 
 — some of them even twelve times ; attending to his health, 
 diet, and medicines in a very special way ; besides the work 
 of Parliament, of office, of society, of gaiety, of masque- 
 writing, with occasional acting and shows to make him like 
 the other gay men of the period. He advised this accom- 
 plishment to young men : " Though the thing itself be
 
 22 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 disreputable in the profession of it, yet it is excellent as a 
 discipline, we mean the action of the theatre "stage-play- 
 ing, which strengthens the memory, regulates the tone 
 and effect of the voice and pronunciation, teaches a decent 
 carriage of the countenance and gesture, gives not a little 
 assurance, and accustoms young men to bear being looked at." 
 
 The amount of disappointment he received through life 
 showed that he had not understood his men any more than 
 his men understood him. His undoubted superiority gave 
 him rivals ; his eagerness to please made him enemies ; his 
 speeches in Parliament offended Elizabeth, who thought 
 him more showy than deep; his secret experiments and 
 " speculations " disgusted his relative, Burleigh. Writing 
 poetry would have been a venial offence compared to this 
 of " speculation." Buckhurst, Raleigh, Davies, Spenser, 
 and many others were known poets and in office. Doubt- 
 less Elizabeth's shrewd eye read his inner character better 
 than he thought — better than her successor did. Under 
 James his efforts to rise were crowned with success, and 
 he fell a victim rather to his vanity and his rivals than to 
 his crimes. 1 Still the forms of bribery and corruption, of 
 which he was accused, and which he acknowledged, are of a 
 most unromantic nature. Much was done by his contem- 
 poraries to lighten his fall ; but he left his memory to the 
 calmer and more dispassionate reasoning of the next ages. 
 
 We must remember he was before his times. The prac- 
 tical nature of his science was considered degrading; his 
 language too plain or too obscure; and his philosophy con- 
 fusing. It did not develope so naturally as that of Bruno, 2 
 writing at the same period. The Instauratio Magna was 
 presented to Sir Edward Coke in 1620, who wrote on the 
 title-page — 
 
 1 See Appendix, Note 11. 
 
 2 Giordano Bruno was in Cambridge from 15S3 to 15S5, lecturing 
 against Aristotle and in favour of the Copernican theory of the rotation 
 of the earth. Bacon believed it to be fixed.
 
 PROBABILITIES. 23 
 
 Edw. C, ex dono Auctoris, 
 
 "Auctori Consilium, 
 Instaurare paras veterurn documenta sophorum, 
 Instaurare Leges Justitiamque prius." 
 
 And over the device of the ship passing between Hercules' 
 Pillars, Sir Edward wrote — 
 
 " It deserveth uot to be read in Schooles, 
 But to be freighted in the 'Ship of Fooles.' " 
 
 Mr. Henry Cuffe said that " a fool could not have written 
 this work, and a wise man would not." And King James 
 used to say the book was " like the peace of God, that 
 passeth all understanding." Yet while in advance of many, 
 he was behind some. He did not agree with Galileo and 
 did not accept the theory of Copernicus. His Thema Coeli 
 gives extraordinary astronomy : " Flamy and sidereal nature 
 produces the starry heavens. Between earth and heaven 
 are three regions — 1st, extinction of flame; 2nd, union of 
 flame ; 3rd, dispersion of flame." He denies the moon to 
 be solid, but flamy. The earth is stationary, the heaven 
 revolves with the exterior of the earth in twenty-four hours, 
 not on movable poles, but cosmical. Some of the planets go 
 slower than others. He affirms spiral motion and denies 
 perfect circles : "These then are the things I see, standing 
 on the threshold of natural history and philosophy; and 
 it may be, the deeper a man has gone into it, the more 
 he will approve them." Sir Thomas Bodley, while prais- 
 ing, criticised sharply both his style and works, and said 
 that " it was only averments without force of argument." 
 Harvey would not allow him to be a great scholar, saying, 
 "He writes philosophy like a Lord Chancellor." Sir Toby 
 Matthew seemed his most faithful admirer through life 
 and death. He was his Boswcll. 
 
 The women he knew, his mother, wife, and queen, sug- 
 gested no poetic types, and he seemed to have imagined 
 none. There is no love in his New Atlantis; his women 
 are silent there.
 
 24 THE BACOX-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 He was constantly occupied either in his professional 
 or his literary and scientific ambitions. How the Baconians 
 imagine he could find time to write the plays, even if he 
 had the inspiration, I know not. The question of time 
 taken, even for his acknowledged writings, occurs to his 
 own mind. In his Epistle Dedicatory to the King prefac- 
 ing his great work, he says : " Your Majesty may perhaps 
 accuse me of larceny, having stolen from your affairs so 
 much time as was required for this work. I know not 
 what to say for myself. For of time there can be no re- 
 stitution, unless it be that what has been abstracted from 
 your business may, perhaps, go to the memory of your 
 name and the honour of your age." 
 
 Yet he found time to write a little verse, always in rhyme 
 when he did try it. His acknowledged poems are scarcely 
 third rate : his masques, such as the Conference of Plea- 
 sure, pompous speeches, with flattery in them, as a means 
 to display magnificent robes to give others pleasure, and 
 thereby further his own advancement. 
 
 In his later years he gave a translation of the Psalms 
 of commonplace type, occasionally even with crude rhymes, 
 such as — 
 
 " The huge Leviathan 
 Doth make the sea to seethe as boiling pan." 
 
 Maurice calls him " this enemy of poets and poetry," 
 because his very definitions of poetry are defective. He 
 considers the drama far from what it ought to be ; " it is 
 not good to remain long in the theatre." 
 
 The real discord in Bacon's life is illustrated in the 
 Geschichte der Philosqphie of Dr. Heinrich Bitter, vol. x. 
 p. 318: "There can be no doubt about the duplicity 
 and weakness of the character of Bacon. In a letter to 
 Thomas Bodley, he confesses the great mistake of his life, 
 that, though drawn by inward inclination to the sciences, 
 he devoted himself to the employments of public life, 
 whilst his heart was not there. It is sad to remark that 

 
 PROBABILITIES. 25 
 
 he should thus have made confession to a friend of this 
 his unfaithfulness to his destined sphere, and yet should 
 not have found in himself the strength to apply the 
 remedy. It was a confession of the lip rather than the 
 heart." 
 
 This is the secret that lay hid behind his mask of 
 statesmanship ; the longing for a life of science, simple, 
 methodical, apart from the fret and shows of city life, and 
 not the longing to write poems ; these he never dreamed of, 
 never honoured, probably never read. He might have 
 heard them acted ; he would not think them worthy of the 
 leisure of his closet. 
 
 We have no information regarding Bacon and Shakspere's 
 acquaintanceship. It is certain they must have heard 
 of each other; it is more than probable they must have 
 met. Possibly characters so different repelled each other, 
 and opportunities of friendship were purposely ignored. 
 On one occasion, when it is almost certain they were in 
 the same hall together, we cannot but think of the two in 
 contrast. At Gray's Inn, December 28, 1594, there were 
 to be high times ; Bacon and others were going to uphold 
 the honour of the old institution, and had invited a 
 goodly company. But the crowd was too large, and pro- 
 ceeded to great uproar and disorders ; and so, in default of 
 those "very good inventions and conceptions," which had 
 been intended for their delectation, the guests had to 
 " content themselves with ordinary dancing and revelling, 
 and when that was over with a comedy of errors (like to 
 Plautus his Mencechmus ] ), which was played by the players. 
 This performance seems to have been considered the 
 crowning misfortune of the evening. A "conjurer" was 
 
 1 Entered at Stationers' Hall, 10th June 1594. "A book entitled 
 ' Mencechmi,' being a pleasant ami fine conceited comedie taken out 
 of the most excellent wittie poet Plautus, chosen purposely from out 
 the rest as being least harmfull and most delightful. Thomas Creed 
 entered for his book."
 
 26 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 arraigned on several charges, of which the last was " that 
 he had foisted a company of base and common fellows, to 
 make up our disorders with a play of errors and con- 
 fusions." The members held a consultation "to recover 
 their lost honour by some graver conceipts." Probably 
 Bacon aided them, for on the 3rd January a very superior 
 one appeared, Divers Plots and Devices, to symbolise the 
 reconciliation between the Gray's Inn and the Temple, 
 which had been disturbed by the Night of Errors. These 
 treated of the laws of knights and the enrolment thereof. 
 Speeches on the glory of war; the study of philosophy; 
 on procuring eternizement and fame by buildings and 
 foundations ; on virtue " and a gracious government. A 
 sixth councillor appeared, advising pastimes and sports. 
 " What ! nothing but tasks, nothing but working days ? 
 No feasting, no music, no dancing, no triumphs, no comedies, 
 no love, no ladies 1 Sweet sovereign, dismiss your other 
 five councillors and take counsel of your five senses ! " 
 Which the Prince of Purpoole answered and then set to 
 dancing. 
 
 " The performance of which night's work, being very 
 carefully and orderly handled, did so delight and please 
 the nobles and the other auditory, that thereby Gray's 
 Inn did not only recover their lost credit, quite take away 
 all the disgrace that the former Night of Errors had 
 incurred, but got instead thereof so great honour and 
 applause, as either the good reports of our honourable 
 friends that were present could yield, or we ourselves 
 desire." Spedding considers the speeches of the councillors 
 " evidently by Bacon ; they carry his signature in every 
 sentence." 
 
 I like to picture that evening; Shakspere and his fellows 
 called in, in hot haste, to try to quell the tumult of the 
 crowd by distracting attention ; and bravely acting through 
 the uproar until interest arose and silence fell, one of their 
 neio conceipts; while Bacon, ashamed, mortified, and per-
 
 PROBABILITIES. 27 
 
 plexed, with the rest of his company, went home brooding 
 how to retrieve the lost honour of Gray's Inn, when base 
 fellows had acted a "mean piece" instead of theirs. I like 
 to imagine Southampton among the nobles ; an appreciative 
 youth, who preferred Shakspere's "Errors" to Bacon's 
 " Councillors." 
 
 " The Gesta Grayorum, or the History of the High and 
 Mighty Prince Henry of Purpoole, who reigned and died 
 1594," reports all this, printed by W. Canning, 1685. l 
 
 Bacon was always among the upper classes. He attained 
 all the desires of his life ; and having attained all, he fell. 
 Bacon lived too long ; had he died at Shakspere's age, he 
 too might have left an unstained name, a mourning wife, 
 and friends who missed him sorely. The sad picture of his 
 later years is one that haunts us ; yet it gives the truth 
 of the man's nature. The pursuit of science lay nearest 
 to his heart ; the ruling passion was strong in death ; and 
 in prosecuting a scientific discovery, he was chilled to the 
 heart, and died in a stranger's house, alone. 
 
 I close here the " probabilities " of these lives. The plan 
 I have proposed to myself is more general than verbally 
 critical. It is not to save people from reading, but to 
 induce them to do so for themselves, that I suesrest these 
 points. 
 
 When we have well studied the contrasts of the lives 
 of the writers, we must see what each of these writers has 
 to say for himself in relation to the plays. 
 
 1 See Spedding's Bacon, vols. i. and ii.
 
 ( 28 ) 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE INTERNAL EVIDENCE OF SHAKSPERE'S PLAYS 
 AND BACON'S BOOKS. 
 
 Distinctions of internal evidence can be drawn from the 
 subjects of the writings, the treatment, the accessories, and 
 the style in relation to the lives of the two men we are 
 considering. Now, though it is too much to say that 
 Bacon would not have chosen any of Shakspere's subjects, 
 it is certainly permissible to assert he could not have 
 chosen all of them ; because Bacon never wrote without 
 some intention, either didactic or practical. Therefore, 
 while some of the histories might have been written as 
 warnings, and others as glorifications of the reigning 
 sovereign, nothing in his life or writings suggests a pos- 
 sibility of his having treated pure poetry for art's sake. 
 There seems no cause likely to have tempted him to 
 select subjects like Midsummer's Night's Dream, Romeo 
 and Jtdiet, As You Like It. The same remark may 
 be applied to the poems. One cannot imagine Bacon 
 selecting either Venus or Lucrece as "inventions" worthy 
 the devotion of his pen. A few masques, a New Atlantic, 
 a few sonnets, a few psalms, are all he has acknowledged. 
 
 But the difference is more strongly exemplified when 
 we turn to the treatment of the subjects. Bacon's criti- 
 cisms of poetry, De Augmentis, book ii. chap, xiii., shows 
 that he considers it has a right to go beyond Nature in 
 treating life, and to introduce a moral and physical order 
 higher than is found compatible with truth. In fact, poetry
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 29 
 
 ought to show things as they ought to be, rather than as they 
 are. This arises from his definition of poetry as feigned. 
 Shakspere never writes thus. He does not make the poet 
 the Providence of the play, but follows Nature and life in 
 his delineations. Where his imaginations act, it is on the 
 same lines as true, not feigned history. Hence Cordelia 
 and Lear are not saved, to live happily ever after, nor are 
 Romeo and Juliet resuscitated to heal the hearts of their 
 parents. Be sure Bacon would have arranged his series 
 so as to make virtue triumphant, as it ought to be. 
 Further he says : " Dramatic poetry would be of excellent use 
 if well directed ; for the stage is capable of no small in- 
 fluence both of discipline and corruption. Now of corrup- 
 tions of this kind we have enough, but the discipline in 
 our times has been plainly neglected. And though in 
 modern states play-acting is esteemed but as a toy, except 
 when it is too satirical and biting, yet among the ancients 
 it was used as a means of educating men's minds to virtue. 
 Nay, it has been regarded by learned men and great philo- 
 sophers as a kind of musician's bow, by which men's minds 
 could be played upon. And certainly it is most true, and 
 one of the great secrets of Nature, that the minds of men 
 are more open to impressions of affections when many are 
 gathered together than when they are alone." 
 
 There is no doubt that by " discipline " he partly meant 
 the rules of the ancient stage, the unities of time, place, 
 and action. The utter regardlessness of the Romantic school 
 of the drama as to the first two of these canons at least, 
 must have ruffled his orderly and cultured soul. That he 
 could so have infringed the forms of dramatic thought was 
 a natural impossibility. It was Aristotle, not zEschylus, 
 he revolted from. 
 
 Bacon did not consider the drama of his time education ; 
 it was only, if more than a toy, satirical and biting; in 
 connection with which he must have remembered the scene 
 in which one of his kindly Ion main did good service.
 
 30 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 When Elizabeth asked hiin, as a lawyer, if there was not 
 treason in Dr. Hay ward's Richard II., " Not treason, 
 madam, but much felony ; ... he hath stolen much from 
 Tacitus." 
 
 But the writer of the plays could not have esteemed 
 them a "toy;" neither were they "satirical and biting;" 
 neither were they " without discipline," though after other 
 laws than Bacon's. They were treated with a solemn pur- 
 pose throughout; men's minds were by them attuned to 
 patience, fortitude, justice, truth, and the other cardinal 
 virtues ; while they forgot not the cardinal needs of men 
 — faith, hope, love, joy, laughter, sympathy, and variety. 
 Bacon was no sympathetic student of psychology ; he did 
 not understand the nature of man otherwise than in 
 natures like his own. He could not project himself, and 
 see the needs of others. He could live without love him- 
 self. " The stage is more beholden to love than the life of 
 man." But how could such a man write so as to incur 
 censure for saying too much of " love's lazy languishment," 
 and receive advice to content himself with graver studies? 
 If he understood the nature of -men little, he understood 
 the nature of women not at all. He might have grasped 
 some superficial character, or some strong strange nature 
 like his mother ; but he could not even imagine such female 
 characters as Juliet, Imogen, Hermione ; any woman 
 with abandon, naivete, purity, faithfulness, gentle strength, 
 would have been a sphinx to him. To imagine love a 
 moving power of life and action, yet subordinate to duty, 
 was beyond his conception. 
 
 Bacon was also almost destitute of the sense of humour, 
 in which the plays are so super-eminently rich. The notices 
 of his contemporaries as to his "wit" need not confuse our 
 ideas. " Wit " with them meant wisdom, and a wealth 
 of allusion, with an antithetic arrangement of ideas, and 
 epigrammatic terseness of expression. His was a form 
 laboured, chiselled, often rechauffe; there was no sense
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 31 
 
 of spontaneity, there was electric light, not sunshine 
 in it. 
 
 His was a kind of wit men remembered, but never 
 laughed at, nor laughed with. We could not imagine him 
 seeing any "humour" in Dogberry, Verges, Autolycus, 
 Bottom, Quince, and his fellows, or even in Sir John 
 Falstaff himself. There was no discipline in these. 
 
 His utter want of sympathy, as shown in his life, is 
 reflected in all his writings. His correspondence with 
 Burleigh showed that he did not grasp that astute relative's 
 ideas ; his connection with Essex proved how incapable he 
 was of measuring that impulsive, generous, rash nature, 
 or of acting on it for good (see his Advice to Lord Essex, 
 with its mean subterfuges and low aims). He was always 
 trying to impress men with himself, instead of allowing 
 them to impress him, as Shakspere did. Hence he did 
 not thrive with Elizabeth ; but the younger, weaker James 
 accepted him at his own terms, and proved that Elizabeth's 
 measurement of him was the wiser. The friendly though 
 hazy and ill-proportioned allusions to Shakspere show how 
 well he had gauged his contemporaries, and how little he 
 either astonished or ruffled them. Everything about him 
 seemed so natural. There is a dangerous opinion abroad, 
 seriously affecting men's judgments, that one must expect 
 the "eccentricities of genius." Now, far from eccentricities 
 being necessary to genius, they are not even natural. They 
 only occur in natures in which an abnormal development 
 of genius in one direction warps all the other powers. The 
 true universal genius, the man in whom all the powers are 
 developed, not irregularly, but regularly, not in abnormal 
 partial growth, but in a gracious all-round, well-balanced 
 proportion, becomes not eccentric but concentric. The circles 
 that should lie farthest from his heart do so, and the nearer 
 you reach to him, there is the more intensity in his feeling. 
 Such a man wrote these plays. All the natural powers of 
 a human mind were broadly and genially developed. To
 
 32 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 him it was a great and living timth, afterwards enunciated 
 by Pope as an antithetic proposition, " The proper study of 
 mankind is man." Hence man and his surroundings, and 
 his surroundings only in relation to man, is the under-current 
 of Shakspere's works. One cannot even suppose Bacon felt 
 this, and only failed in expressing it. He was a natural 
 philosopher, not a moral philosopher ; not a metaphysic 
 philosopher, which Shakspere was, ever looking at the 
 roots of things. 
 
 Hence in the relative triviality of the outer circle of mere 
 nature, mere history, mere dates, mere facts, Shakspere 
 often erred, but his errors never affected his meaning. 
 Bacon would not have erred thus, because he was nearer 
 the external circle of Nature on one side than to the heart 
 of things. He too was a genius, but an eccentric one. 
 
 But even more distinctive than either subjects or 
 methods of treatment were the " accessories." Shak- 
 spere was a man who had been " educated;" and the form 
 he chose for himself was peculiarly his own. Bacon was 
 first of all "instructed." He had been a sickly youth. 
 It was all brain with him and no body. Only after 
 his period of instruction did he begin his period of self- 
 evolution or education. This was essentially characterised 
 by patient, methodical, exact research, with every oppor- 
 tunity accepted and exhausted, with a disposition to 
 combat contemporary ideas, and with a wide grasp of 
 coming possibilities. 
 
 The learning of Shakspere is just such as might have 
 been commenced, amid varied interruptions, at a good 
 grammar-school, and finished by later reading and conver- 
 sation. Though, like Keats, he was keenly sympathetic 
 with ancient story and literature, his classics were eclectic 
 and uncertain ; his linguistic education fragmentary ; his 
 science undeveloped ; his reading limited, and unguided by 
 more than opportunity and inclination. 
 
 The learning of Bacon ranged over all that was known
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 33 
 
 and had been known to man, in history, philosophy, and 
 science, and he supplemented this by continual experiments, 
 observations, and correspondence. He knew several lan- 
 guages, read largely in all, and wrote much in Latin. 
 
 Just as one can say it is impossible that Shakspere could 
 have written Bacon without a learning he did not possess, 
 so we can say it was impossible for Bacon to have written 
 Shakspere without putting into the poems some of the 
 learning he did possess. 
 
 The heterogeneous nature of Shakspere's interests 
 have been taken to show his knowledge. In one way it 
 does so, but not in another'. The child who has only just 
 learned that each twinkling star in the midnight sky is a 
 sun and the centre of a system of worlds like his own, is 
 more impressed with the magnitude and poetry of the idea 
 than many an astronomer who has swept the sky for fifty 
 years. He is also more likely to talk of his discovery. 
 Even so was Shakspere like the child ; Bacon, the astro- 
 nomer. Shakspere brought in all he knew, sometimes 
 deficient in fact, never in thought or feeling. Bacon, in- 
 clined to do the same, would have had much more matter 
 to introduce ; more true to fact, more exact in method, but 
 deficient in philosophic unity and devoid of human feeling. 
 
 To go through all the works of either man and print all 
 the contrasts is beyond my task. The result would make 
 this little book a tome, and would perhaps help to prevent 
 my readers from going to the originals thoughtfully for 
 themselves. A host of inaccuracies in history and science, 
 that would have been impossible to Bacon, appear in the 
 plays ; and these inaccuracies do not always occur in posi- 
 tions where, to interest the groundlings, some contempo- 
 rary incident might have been innocently introduced into 
 ancient tales. As Mrs. Cowden Clarke says : " Had 
 Shakspere attended to the histoi'y and manners of Britain 
 in the days of King Lear, he would not have grown 
 what Douce calls 'so plentiful a crop of blunders.'
 
 34 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 He would not have talked of ' Turks ; ' of ' Bedlam Beg- 
 gars;' of 'Childe Roland;' nor of 'Nero.'" He speaks 
 of the Turks as in possession of Constantinople in King 
 Henry V.'s reign, though they did not take it until 1453. 
 
 Bacon would not have had courage or rashness enough 
 to have so combined and falsified the story of Macbeth by 
 basing it on two tales of different dates in Scottish history ; 
 nor would he have introduced "cannon" into it, "as can- 
 nons overcharged with double cracks," Act i. sc. 1 ; also, 
 "The thunder of my cannon shall be heard," John, Act i. 
 sc. 1. John commenced to reign in 1199, and the first 
 cannon were heard at Crecy in 1346. 
 
 Even in earlier dates, " If I can get him within my 
 pistol's length, I'll make him sure," Pericles, Act i. sc. 1. 
 And in 1 Henry IV., Act ii. sc. 4, he speaks again of 
 pistols. " That sprightly Scot of Scots, Douglas, that runs up 
 a hill perpendicular : he that rides at high speed, and with 
 his pistol kills a sparrow flying." Jonson criticises this. 
 
 " A piece many years in doing, and now newly performed, 
 by that rare Italian, Master Julio Romano," Act v. sc. 2, 
 Winter's Tale, introduces a compliment to the greatest 
 artist of his time in conjunction with an oracle of Apollo. 
 An allusion in the same play is made to " Judas Iscariot." 
 
 He speaks of Hamlet " going back to school in Witten- 
 berg," though the University there was not founded until 
 1502, five hundred years after Hamlet's death. 
 
 " And set the murderous Macchiavel to school," 3 Henry 
 VI, Act iii. sc. 2, before Macchiavelli was born. 
 
 In Troilus and Cressida, Act ii. sc. 2, " Unlike young 
 men, whom Aristotle thought unfit to hear moral l philo- 
 sophy," says Hector. Also, " Bull-bearing Milo his addi- 
 tion yield to sinewy Ajax." Both Aristotle and Milo lived 
 long after Hector. 
 
 1 It is brought forward on the Baconian side the fact that both 
 Bacon and Shakspere quote Aristotle as saying " moral " while he said 
 " political philosophy." Both, however, followed Baudwin in this,
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 35 
 
 " Thou wert a soldier even to Cato's wish," Coriolanus, 
 Act i. sc. 4, though Coriolanus preceded Cato. 
 
 Also in the same play, " The most sovereign prescription 
 in Galen is but empirieutic," involves an error of six and 
 a half centuries. 
 
 Bacon had written a work on Horology, and understood 
 clocks. He knew they were unknown to the Romans. 
 Yet we find — 
 
 " Peace, count the clock : — 
 The clock hath stricken three." 
 
 (Julius Ccvsar, Act ii. sc. i.) 
 
 They appear also in Cymbeline and in Winter's Tale. 
 
 The geography of the plays is as un-Baconian as the 
 chronology. They speak of sailing from Verona to Milan, 
 when only a carriage could connect these cities. " Our ship 
 hath touched upon the desert of Bohemia," Winter's Tale, 
 Act iii. sc. 3. Jonson is severe upon this. 
 
 Foreign natural history is also distinctly hazy. It is 
 different with local natural history. 
 
 The name of Stratford does not appear in the plays, and 
 the name of St. Albans does ; but that does not prove the 
 plays written by a St. Albans man. It only shows that 
 the writer knew English history and geography better 
 than he knew Continental affairs. On the other hand, the 
 words and phrases are much more suggestive of Stratford 
 and Warwickshire than of any other place. The " proper 
 names " applied to subordinate characters in the plays are 
 many of them Stratfordian, such as Bardolph, Fluellen, 
 Peto, Curtis, Travers, Gower, Gregory, Clement, Perkes 
 o' the Hill, Barton, Wincot. Some have supposed that 
 Wincot was a contraction for Wilmecote, the place of Mary 
 Arden's birth. But it is not so. There is a " "Wincot " 
 pure and simple within a mile or two of Stratford, 
 and there was a Wincot in the days of Shakspere ; and 
 what is more striking, Mr. Savage of Stratford has only 
 just discovered from the local registers that " Hackets " 
 
 c
 
 .1 
 
 6 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 lived there. Wore any of that family " the fat ale- 
 wife of Wincot " ? — Induction to Taming of the Shrew. 
 We see in Sir Aston Cokaine's address " to Mr. Fisher 
 of Wincot," quoted chapter v., that there was then an 
 established connection between Wincot and its ale. Mr. 
 Savage says the old Hall measured thirty-four feet in 
 length ; that the nearest house in the neighbouring village, 
 a few hundred yards from the gate, is still left outlined in 
 its foundations, and much resembles the design of an inn ; 
 and that the " Hackets " lived in that house. The want of 
 artistic connection between the Induction and the Taming 
 of the Shrew may very naturally be explained, if, at the 
 time that the town-council of Stratford shut its guild-hall 
 to the Lord Chamberlain's players, they should have been 
 invited to act by the owner of Wincot, and embodied some 
 practical joke of their host with local allusions, that always 
 interest the company, before they began the play proper to 
 their tour, for which they had dresses and parts prepared. 
 It shows the value in criticism of trifling detail ; when 
 little things are pieced together wisely, they make a tessel- 
 lated pavement with a meaning in it. " Old Sly's son of 
 Barton-Heath " is a true name. " Cotsall " evidently means 
 Cotswold. " Ford " and " Page " are Stratford as well as 
 Windsor names. " Roland de Boys," an extinct family of 
 Weston-in-Arden. " Thomas Jakes of Wonersh," a gentle- 
 man of Henry VI., was a Warwickshire man ; some of the 
 name still live near Stratford. " William Visor of Win- 
 cot against Clement Perkes of the Hill." Is this a local 
 pronunciation of Fisher of Wincot, a misspelling, or a 
 misprint 1 (2 King Henry IV.) Many of the Stratford 
 records earlier than Shakspere have the name of Hamlet 
 and Hamelot, as well as Hamnet. Allusions also to the 
 characters of the Coventry Mysteries appear in the plays, 
 "Herod and Pilate," "Cain and Judas," "Termagant," 
 "Turbaned Turks and Infidels." 
 
 It is, however, the absence of many things that speak
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 37 
 
 more strongly against the claim for Bacon than the pre- 
 sence of others. 
 
 As the genius of the two differs throughout, so does the 
 life of their work. There is a want of free air in Bacon's 
 works, a want of horizon, perspective, light and shade ; 
 there is a want of youth, health, and happiness, freedom 
 and space. One cannot imagine Bacon going forth to the 
 chase on the lusty charger of Adonis, or careering post- 
 haste over the country as the bearer of news. Mr. Flower 
 of Stratford -on- A von wrote a little pamphlet called Shalc- 
 spere on Horseback, showing how well he knew every point 
 in a good horse ; how well he understood the joy of a wild 
 career; and the sympathy that grows between a master 
 and a well- treated horse. 1 We have only, on the other side, 
 to turn to Bacon's works to see the forms of interest he 
 took in horses. " Every tenant by knight's service is 
 obliged to keep one horse for the king's use." " English 
 horses for strength and swiftness are not excelled by those 
 of any other country." "Horses' flesh is eaten by some 
 nations." "Horses' teeth give the mark of age." "The 
 tooth of the sea-horse made into a ring is good for the 
 cramp." "I leave my wife my four horses for the caro- 
 ache " (Bacon's will). 
 
 This is all he has about this noble animal. It is evident 
 he knew little of the pleasures of horses and riding, and a 
 free leap and a firm seat ; little of the deep-baying hounds, 
 
 1 " Look, when a painter would surpass the life 
 In limning out a well-proportioned steed, 
 His art with Nature's workmanship at strife, 
 As if the dead the living should exceed ; 
 So did this horse excel a common one 
 In shape, in courage, e<>lour, pace, and bone. 
 Round-hoofed, short-jointed, fetlocks shag and long, 
 Broad breast, full eye, small head, and nostril wide, 
 High crest, short ears, straight legs, and passing strong, 
 Thick mane, thick tail, broad buttock, tender hide ; 
 Look, what a horse should have he did not lack, 
 Save a proud rider on so proud a back." — Venus and Adonis.
 
 38 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 the hunt and the hare. But Bacon knew " how to stunt 
 the growth of dogs and make them little ; " and Bacon 
 thought that " if a dog bit in anger, a stone thrown at him, 
 he communicated a choleric quality to the powder of it." 
 
 Similes constantly occur in the Plays that could only 
 have been suggested by a man of exercise from bowling, 
 archery, wrestling. Bacon's physical frame forbade this. 
 
 Much has been made of the law in Shakspere. This 
 might easily have been acquired in his experience in 
 Stratford, from his father and Thomas Greene ; from 
 attending the law-courts (a favourite habit of writers of 
 the period) ; or from attending the lawyers' taverns. (See 
 chap, i.) It is only just such law the Plays can show. A 
 Bacon could not have imagined the law in the Merchant of 
 Venice. 
 
 Much also is made of his medical knowledge. But in 
 those days of quackery, many men knew more of medicine 
 than they do in these division-of-labour days. He had a 
 friend, afterwards son-in-law, a skilful and famous phy- 
 sician ; and among Vautrollier and Field's publications 
 were medical books of note. It is strange that the forms 
 of medical knowledge displayed in Shakspere's plays are 
 not those that most rivet Bacon's attention in his works. 
 But there is more than learning in the making of a man, 
 especially of a poet. 
 
 The Plays are evidently the work of an actor of the very 
 modern English school of dramatic art, and not of a listener. 
 Only a player could have recognised and introduced the 
 various trifles, so telling to contemporaries of the period he 
 lived in ; the alterations of the scenes, not only to relieve 
 the feelings of the audience, but to give the actors time to 
 dress ; the stage directions in the play-scene in Hamlet 
 and in Midsummers Night's Dream. The whole series were 
 created by a player for the people. Bacon would have 
 scorned their scholarship, despised their neglect of the 
 unities, denied their passion, and ignored their wit. Ben 

 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 39 
 
 Jonson was more near to him in every way, and it would 
 have been much more natural to say that he had written 
 Ben Jonson 's plays to teach Shakspere how to do it. 
 
 Bacon was no player, though he spent some time in 
 preparing gorgeous masques, where expenditure showed a 
 gentlemanly superiority to profit. 
 
 The Sonnets expressly say the writer was a player, and 
 was at mental discord with his profession; they say he 
 was a poet, whose lofty rhymes should live, and that his 
 name was Will. They harmonise with expressions else- 
 where, and with the general tone of feeling in the Plays ; 
 and whoever wrote the one might be treated as able to 
 write the other. 
 
 Soxxet ex. 
 
 " Alas, 'tis true, I have gone here and there, 
 
 And made myself a motley to the view, 
 Gored mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear, 
 
 Made old offences of affections new : 
 Most true it is, that I have looked on truth 
 
 Askance and strangely ; . . ." 
 
 Sonnet cxi. 
 
 " Oh, for my sake do you with fortune chide, 
 The guilty goddess of my harmful deeds, 
 That did not better for my life provide 
 
 Thau public means, which public manners breeds." 
 
 Sonnet cxxxvi. 
 
 " If thy soul check thee, that I come so near, 
 
 Swear to thy bliud soul that I was thy Will." . . . 
 Make but my name thy love, and love that still, 
 And then thou lov'st me— for my name is Will." 
 
 Though considering that the Sonnets would live, he 
 evidently considered himself able for higher work. I 
 rather fancy that in this one instance his feeling and 
 Bacon's coincided, and that he would have named them
 
 4 o THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 " toys," even if he did not really mean them as a satire on 
 the romantic sonnets of the period, as Mr. Brown suggests. 
 If he did so, then in them, as in the character of Falstaff, 
 he was a fellow-worker with his famous contemporary 
 Cervantes, in killing with ridicule the last outbursts of 
 mediaeval chivalry, then dead at heart and root. 
 
 The whole structure of language in the two writers is 
 as characteristic, and therefore as different, as is possible 
 in the case of two great men living at the same time, 
 in the same city, serving the same sovereign, rubbing 
 shoulders with the same men, conversing with the same 
 wits, hoping the same national thoughts. Shakspere's was 
 of an older date, a more simple, homely, national use than 
 Bacon's. The style also is distinct ; and this not altogether 
 dependent on the different forms of verse and prose, as 
 Bacon has just owned enough poetry, and Shakspere enough 
 prose, to mark their varieties. 
 
 Bacon's and Shakspere's prose are perfectly different. 
 Bacon's verse, when he writes it, is always rhymed ; Shak- 
 spere's generally in blank verse. Bacon's style is antithetic, 
 epigrammatic. Shakspere's, though varied with the passion 
 of the speaker, has a gradual growth, tending rather to end 
 in a climax when fervours are on him, or to break abruptly, 
 suggesting the inexpressible. Shakspere often mixes his 
 metaphors and crowds his allusions, in a way Bacon would 
 not have done. 
 
 One very striking point of contrast has not been suffi- 
 ciently noted elsewhere. Bacon is essentially a subjective 
 writer — subjective to an extraordinary degree, even when 
 he is scientific. He writes much in the first person ; his 
 very experiments are narrated as "singular" or "in con- 
 sort ; " his great Idea is an invitation to mankind to work 
 with him. The hundreds of his letters which have been 
 preserved also show this peculiarity, which at times deve- 
 loped into vanity ; and he was aware of it ; for he says, " I 
 know I am censured of some conceit of mine ability."
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 41 
 
 Shakspere, on the other hand, is objective to as extra- 
 ordinary a degree. He never writes in the first person, 
 except in the Sonnets, and even there we can notice an 
 objective dominating power, and a suggestion that they 
 too might have been written dramatically, or as a natural 
 expression or voice for the friends to whom he gave them 
 to exDress their feelings to their friends. In all other 
 
 A. O 
 
 writings, the man Shakspere never brings himself forward 
 by word or suggestion. The actor element in him throws 
 him so intensely into the real life of the being he deli- 
 neates, that he becomes, as it were, simply a vehicle to 
 carry the thoughts of a Romeo, a Hamlet, a Caesar, a Lear, 
 where even the use of the first and second persons are 
 practically the third to him. 
 
 The unobtrusiveness of Shakspere's life reflected itself 
 in his writings. His dramatic form veiled him, as he 
 intended it should. It could not have veiled Bacon. You 
 would at once have been able to pick out which character 
 he meant most nearly to represent himself, as you can do 
 in Byron. When Bacon writes for the stage, he writes 
 masques, utterly unlike Shakspere, and just like himself — 
 thoughtful, heavy, and adulatory. "They answer very 
 well to the general description in Bacon's Essays of what a 
 masque should be, with its loud and cheerful music, abun- 
 dance of light and colour, graceful motions and forms, and 
 such things as do naturally take the sense " (Spedding's 
 Bacon). 
 
 With the same exception of the Sonnets, Shakspere also 
 writes little to the second person. Bacon is always intensi- 
 fying its use, and is full of flattery as well as dedication. 
 Not only does he lavish it on Elizabeth and James, but on 
 every one who could in any way help him. That it was the 
 position and not the man he honoured, may be seen by the 
 way he forgot the warm, helpful cordiality of Essex ; and 
 prepared adulation and advice for succeeding royal favour- 
 ites, however unworthy. This, though partly a part of
 
 42 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 character, is also an element of style, only to be discovered 
 now in the literary works of each. 
 
 The simple, manly character of Shakspere prevented 
 him ever writing "Panegyrics," "Elegies," " Dedications," 
 of the fulsome type in which Bacon constantly indulged. 
 He never mentions Elizabeth openly, except in Cranmer's 
 speech in Henry VIII. and in the Merry Wives of Windsor. 
 He never alludes to James except in Macbeth. The simple 
 dedication of his two poems to Southampton by Shakspere 
 may be compared to Bacon's dedication of his Advancement 
 of Learning to James ; and the thought must be impressed 
 upon every reader that the same mind could not have used 
 such differing forms. 
 
 Even in the treatment of the third person they are very 
 different. The progress of their development also is diffe- 
 rent, Shakspere's style begins profuse and ends terse ; Bacon 
 begins terse and somewhat bald, and ends with greater 
 freedom, variety, and richness. 
 
 No author more often repeats similar phrases and ideas, 
 sometimes identical, than Bacon, because he was a scientist ; 
 while the recurrences of Shakspere are few, and are modified 
 by the mood and the circumstance, as becomes a poet and 
 a seer. 
 
 Shakspere writes as if he forgets everything he had 
 written before. Bacon's good things are always cropping 
 up again, in new combinations and connections, as if Bacon 
 the writer never forgets Bacon the author. 
 
 One resemblance the Baconians do not notice, though it 
 is a likeness with a difference. They both borroio largely, 
 and they do not acknowledge it. Shakspere, however, 
 borrows to illustrate his subject, and under conditions in 
 which he could not acknowledge his debts. Bacon bor- 
 rows, but it is to increase his own glory, and in circum- 
 stances under which he could have very well acknowledged 
 his authorities. In his Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert 
 Burton does so, and says, " I have wronged no man ; I have
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 43 
 
 given every man his own ; " and where it would be inar- 
 tistic to mention the authors' names in the text, he puts 
 them in a series of side-notes, most impressive to every 
 reader. This book has been also said to be Bacon's by 
 some of the Baconians ; but this peculiar literary honesty 
 of Burton's is quite sufficient to disprove any such claim. 
 We find Bacon borrowing his Essays, not only from classic 
 sources, 1 but wholesale from Montaigne, and a small volume 
 of Essays by J. S., published in 1596, altogether unacknow- 
 ledged. We find his New Atlantis not only suggested in 
 idea from Plato, but in plan from Sir Thomas More's 
 Utopia, and in title and circumstance borrowed from Bur- 
 ton himself. The Anatomy of Melancholy, published in 
 1 62 1 and signed by Burton, contained this passage: "I 
 will yet, to satisfy myself, make a Utopia of mine own, a 
 New Atlantis, a poetical commonwealth of mine own, in 
 which I will freely domineer, build cities, make laws and 
 statues as I list myself;" and then goes on to sketch his 
 ideas, which marvellously resemble Bacon's New Atlantis, 
 appearing in 1627. 
 
 Christian Paradoxes he never claimed, so that it is no 
 discredit to him that the Bev. Alexander Grosart should 
 have found they were the work of Herbert Palmer, B.D. 
 They were published anonymously on the 24th July 1645, 
 in a pirated edition, spoken of in the author's works ; and 
 the very next da)', 2$ih July 1645, they were published in 
 full, as Part II. of the Memorials of Godliness and Chris- 
 tianity, by Herbert Palmer, B.D., Master of Queen's Coll., 
 Cambridge. They were printed as Bacon's first in 1648, 
 after the death of Palmer. This is only here introduced 
 because much of the reasoning on his religious feeling was 
 based on this little work. 
 
 But Bacon did most essentially claim the whole and sole 
 glory of his " great work." Yet his great namesake, Roger 
 Bacon, who died in 1292, had also written an Opus Majus, 
 
 1 See Appendix, note 12.
 
 44 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Opus Minus, and Opus Tertium ; had also fought against the 
 adoration of Aristotle, the power of authority and appear- 
 ances, the neglect of experiment. Some of his ideas wonder- 
 fully suggest the Novum Organum ; for instance, "Appear- 
 ances alone rule men, and they care not what they know, so 
 they are thought to know by a senseless multitude. There 
 are four principal stumbling-blocks in the way of arriving at 
 knowledge — authority, habit, appearances as they present 
 themselves to the vulgar eye, and concealment of ignorance 
 combined with the ostentation of knowledge. We must 
 prefer reason to custom. Though the whole world be pos- 
 sessed by these causes of error, let us freely hear opinions 
 contrary to established usage " (Opus Majus, Roger Bacon). 
 Not only great ideas, but many rich phrases are borrowed 
 from various authors, such as Heywood, Baudwin, Greene, 
 Erasmus, Lyly, and even Shakspere himself, without any 
 acknowledgment. I am not touching this as a moral ques- 
 tion, but as a question of style common to Shakspere and 
 Bacon in a certain degree. But the process and result of 
 the amalgamation differs in each case entirely. What 
 Shakspere borrows is always the inferior part of what he 
 creates; with Bacon it is not always so. Shakspere's 
 finished work is a chemical combination; Bacon's a phy- 
 sical mixture. Hence, through the seer's inspiration, 
 Shakspere is often far ahead of the commonplace "ad- 
 vancement of the sciences " in Bacon's schemes, and some- 
 times far behind. In the observational, experimental 
 sciences, Bacon is at his best. He attends to each point, 
 however vulgar ; he expresses each step with an exactitude 
 at that time unknown ; and he tells whether each experi- 
 ment had been performed by him alone, or in concert with 
 some other person (not named), or whether he had only 
 taken them on hearsay. It is in a point of science then 
 that we must look for the crucial test for the distinction 
 of the two writers — a point of science, however, that has 
 another aspect in a philosophic and social relation.
 
 ( 45 ) 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 SPECIAL ILLUSTRATION. 
 
 There is only one manufacture, treated both by Bacon and 
 Shakspere, that gives an opportunity of revealing their 
 scientific and psychologic methods of treatment. This I 
 have worked out exhaustively, as I believe the distinction 
 is critically valuable as well as original. 
 
 The relation each holds to wine, spirits, and beer is 
 peculiar. Bacon considers no experiment too vulgar to be 
 regarded. Trade facts and habits had been collected and 
 criticised by his thoughtful mind. He notices wine more 
 than beer ; cyder with much interest ; perry and mead a 
 little ; spirits, in any separate modern form, not at all. He 
 gives advice as to the process of wine-making — methods of 
 grafting vines, of training and manuring them, of ripening 
 and preserving grapes ; of the must, clarification, matura- 
 tion, and methods of treatment, such as burying, heating, 
 cooling. He tests the relative weights of wine and water. 
 He treats of barley as seed, as growing corn, drying corn, 
 as malt, as mash, as beer, and of other forms of grain that 
 might be used as malt. He writes of hops, of finings, of 
 casking, of bottling, of preserving, of doctoring. He gives 
 valuable historical information as to the taxes on ale-houses, 
 and the monopoly of sweet wines ; legal information regard- 
 ing felony, pardonable when a man is mad, but not when 
 he is drunk. He writes the natural history of drunkenness 
 and its effects. He gives some preventives against ine- 
 briety — i.e., by burning wine, taking sugar with it — taking
 
 46 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 large draughts rather than small ones — and recommends 
 oil or milk as an antidote to its after-effects. 
 
 The moral question never touches him ; not even in his 
 Colours of Good and Evil does he consider drink in rela- 
 tion to character. The psychological effect is treated only 
 physiologically. Man, to him, is but a means of experi- 
 menting upon the various effects of spirit in wine. 
 
 We do not hear of Bacon mingling with the " people," 
 or indulging in their " small ales," though he uses beer 
 chiefly with medicine. Being a gentleman, and moving 
 only among gentlemen, he chiefly affected wine, probably 
 of expensive sorts, as he was a connoisseur. 
 
 Shakspere, in his non-dramatic poems — i.e., Venus and 
 Adonis, Lucre ce, Passionate Pilgrim, Sonnets, &c, never 
 mentions wine or strong drink, as if it did not play so 
 large a part in his life as the Baconians think. But it is 
 different when we turn from the poems that shadow forth 
 his own thoughts, to those that represent the thoughts of 
 others. He knows that stimulants form an important 
 element, not only of action, but also of character. The 
 author of Shakspere was always ready to suggest what 
 knowledge he had gleaned on every subject. Had he been 
 Bacon, he could not have avoided some allusions to his 
 knowledge and experiments on this point. Among the 
 many trades and professions, the critics have "proved" 
 that Shakspere "must have practised," no one suggested 
 his being a brewer, distiller, wine-maker, maltster, or 
 lecturer on the art of manufacturing liquors, as one might 
 well have said of Bacon. Indeed, Mrs. Pott gives as one 
 reason that he could not have written the Plays, that he 
 did not allude to a brewing, &c. Now, we see that this 
 test acts quite on the other side. Mr. Donnelly now says 
 that Shakspere teas a brewer, but he gives no proof of 
 this. I am not going to contest this affirmation now, 
 only this is just the profession in which he would require 
 most help from Bacon. Shakspere, in his plays, at least
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 47 
 
 receives and knows only the "finished product," and treats 
 it only in relation to man. He was acquainted with the 
 use of stimulants as known in a house, an inn, or an ale- 
 house, as he had proved in many a parish between Strat- 
 ford and London. We find he knew the value of " froth 
 and lime " and " sugar " to the tapster, probably learned 
 when, in some holiday, he enacted the part he gave to 
 Prince Henry. He knew that tapsters sometimes put 
 water in their beer ; that brewing was one of the duties of 
 a good housewife ; that ale and beer were the drinks of the 
 people, and where they could best be got. He was aware 
 that wine was the drink of some foreign nations, who con- 
 sidered themselves on that account superior to the " ale- 
 drinking Englishmen ; " that wine was the drink of the 
 upper classes in this country, probably from its greater cost 
 and its higher and more subtle effects. There were no 
 temperance drinks invented at that time, and a man had 
 then only to choose between water and beer or wine when 
 he wished to drink. The habit of drinking healths was in 
 full fashion' in his day; and the "heavy drinking'* 3 had 
 begun amongst Englishmen which had previously prevailed 
 among the Germans and Dutch. 1 A number of interest- 
 ing phrases are preserved to us in relation to this special 
 subject. One little geographical notice tells powerfully in 
 favour of Shakspere, if not against Bacon. In the Induc- 
 tion to the Taming of the Shrew, he praises the power of 
 the " Wincot ale," which sent Christopher Sly to sleep. 
 Now, Wincot was a village at a walking distance from 
 Stratford, famed for its ale, which no doubt Shakspere had 
 often tasted on his youthful wanderings ; but we have no 
 record of Bacon having tried that decoction. 
 
 Cyder, perry, and mead are never mentioned. ISTo allu- 
 sion appears in any drinking scene to spirits by any modern 
 name, except aqua vital, which appears twice — once in con- 
 nection with an Irishman, hence not meaning brandy. 
 
 1 See Dekkar, Gascoigne, Sir John Smith, Nash, Stubbs, Earle.
 
 48 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 When Juliet's nurse calls out, " Some aqua vitse, ho ! " it 
 is supposed to be simply a restorative. But while giving 
 thus comparatively little information on the objective nature 
 of these drinks, Shakspere has given us a masterly analysis 
 of the subjective effects of stimulants in various degrees on 
 different minds, and the views they have of it. The simple 
 honest Adam, in As You Like It, considers his abstinence 
 in youth the cause of his health and strength in age. Falstaff 
 is always requiring a reinforcement of Dutch courage in 
 " an intolerable deal of sack to a halfpenny- worth of bread;" 
 and he gives us the reason of Prince Henry's superiority 
 over his father, his free use of wine. Lady Macbeth is 
 made " bold " by what had made her attendants drunk. 
 The degradation of a higher nature is shown in Mark 
 Antony ; but the most masterly description of the effects 
 on an imaginative, sensitive, and hot-blooded man is shown 
 in Cassio. He knows he cannot stand much wine ; he has 
 already suffered in the past ; he has resolved to have no 
 more than one cup ; tempted to his destruction by the cold- 
 blooded villain Iago, by specious pretexts, he feels the full 
 shame of his broken resolve to himself, of his broken faith 
 to Othello, as a moral death. 
 
 In several of his plays, Shakspere makes no mention of 
 any stimulant ; these are the Midsummer's Night's Dream, 
 Love's Labours Lost, Winter's Tale, All's Well That Ends 
 Well, Comedy of Errors, Richard II. , Part 3, Henry VI., 
 and Titus Andronicus. The only allusion in Much Ado 
 About Nothing is Leonato's invitation to Dogberry, " Drink 
 some wine ere you go ; " and in King John the only sugges- 
 tion lies in Faulconbridge's exclamation : — 
 
 "St. George, that swinged the dragon, and ere since 
 Sits on his horseback at mine hostess' door, 
 Teach us some fence ! " 
 
 It is interesting to note the different kinds of stimulant 
 and the names of the vessels and accessories in_different 
 plays :—
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 49 
 
 "Cup of Charneco," "Sack," "Pot of double beer," 
 "Three-hooped pot," "Claret," "Wine," and "Beer." 
 (Henry VI, Part 2.) 
 
 "Butt of Malmsey," "Sop," "Wine." (King Richard 
 
 III.) 
 
 " Pot of small ale," " Pot of the smallest ale," " Stone 
 jugs and sealed quarts," "Fat alewife," "Sheer ale," "On 
 the score." (Ind. to Taming of the Shrew.) 
 
 " Muscadel and sops." (Taming of the Shrew.) 
 
 " Wine and wassail," " Drink." (Macbeth.) 
 
 "Drunken spilth of wine," "Subtle juice o' the grape," 
 " Honest water." (Timon of Athens.) 
 
 "Cup us," "Vats," "Tippling," "Wine." (Antony and 
 Cleopatra.) 
 
 "Stoops of wine," "Measure," "Potations pottle-deep," 
 "Flowing cups," "Old fond paradoxes to make fools laugh 
 in the alehouse," "Chronicle small-beer," " The wine she 
 drinks is made of grapes," "Cup," "Canakin," "Potent in 
 potting," " Pottle," " Pint," " Dead drunk." (Othello.) 
 
 " Stoops [or, as in first folio, stopes] of wine," " Flagon 
 of Rhenish," "The Queen carouses," " Throw a union in 
 the cup," "A stoup of liquor." (Hamlet.) 
 
 "Can," "Canary," "Cakes and ale," "Stoop of wine." 
 (Twelfth Night.) 
 
 " Aqua vitae," " Healths five fathom deep." (Romeo and 
 Juliet.) 
 
 " Pot of ale," " Cups of ales." (Henry V.) 
 
 " Quart of sack," "Toast," "Spigot," "Canary," "Pipe- 
 wine," "Wine and sugar," " Pottle of burnt sack," "Toast," 
 "Aqua vitae bottle," " Fap." (Merry Wives of Windsor.) 
 
 "Ale and cakes," "Baiting of bumbards [ale-barrels]." 
 (King Henry VIII.) 
 
 "Sack," "Bottle," "Wine." (Tempest.) 
 
 " Bowl of wine " (in Julius Caesar, Pericles, and Richard 
 III.) 
 
 "Bottle brandished," "Sherris," " Sherris sack," " Tbe
 
 50 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 poor creature, small-beer," "Canaries," "Crack a quart," 
 " Pottlepot." (Henry IV, Part 5.) 
 
 "These mad, mustachio, purple-hued malt worms," 
 "Bombard of sack," "A brewer's horse," "Madeira," 
 "Pint," 1." Cup of wine," "Brown bastard," "Tavern," 
 "Bottle." (Henry IV, Part 1.) 
 
 " Glasses is your only drinking," says Falstaff when his 
 landlady complains she must sell her silver if he will not 
 pay her bill. But "glass," to hold liquor, was then an 
 innovation, as shown in contemporary literature, and it 
 is only mentioned elsewhere once — i.e., in Merchant of 
 Venice. 
 
 Shakspere also shows many of the habits prevailing in 
 the country at his time. While alluding to "brewers" 
 and to " brewers' horses," he shows the prevalence of 
 private brewing, chiefly by women, and the habits of 
 drinking beer in those days, before the importation of tea, 
 coffee, and cocoa. 
 
 In the Two Gentlemen of Verona, Speed, in giving a 
 "catelog " of a maiden's conditions, says : — 
 
 She brews good ale. 
 
 Launce. And thereof comes the proverb, " Blessing o' your heart, 
 you brew good ale." 
 
 Speed. She will often praise her liquor. 
 
 Launce. If her liquor be good, she shall ; if she will not, I will ; for 
 good things should be praised. (Act ii. sc. 1.) 
 
 Also Doctor Caius has for his housekeeper Mrs. Quickly 
 (Merry Wives of Windsor) : — 
 
 Quickly. I keep his house ; and I wash, wring, brew, bake, scour, 
 dress meat and drink, make the beds, and do all myself. 
 
 Simple. 'Tis a great charge to come under one body's hands. 
 
 (Act i. sc. 4.) 
 
 In Act iii. sc. 3, Mrs. Ford says to her men-servants, "Be 
 ready here, hard by in the brewhouse." 
 
 He tells us that " Good wine needs no bush. . . . Yet 

 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 51 
 
 to good wine they do use good bushes." (Epilogue to As 
 
 You Lilce It.) 
 
 We find a general use of " sops in wine." 
 In the Taming of the Shrew, Act iii. sc. 2 : — 
 
 After many ceremonies done, 
 He calls for wine : " A health," quoth he, as if 
 He had been aboard, carousing to his mates 
 After a storm ; quaffed off the muscadel. 
 And threw the sops all in the sexton's face, 
 Having no other reason, 
 But that his beard grew thin and gingerly, 
 And seemed to ask him sops, as he was drinking. 1 
 
 Sir John FalstafT was much attracted by " sops " in 
 wine and "toasts" in his sack; and an allusion to the 
 habit is given in Richard III., when the 1st Murderer 
 says : — 
 
 Throw him [Clarence] in the Malmsey butt in the next room. 
 2nd Murderer. Oh ! excellent device, and make a sop of him. 
 
 (Act i. sc. 4.) 
 
 "Cakes and ale " seemed to have been given at chris- 
 tenings; for at Westminster the porter beats back the 
 crowd at the christening of the infant, afterwards Queen 
 Elizabeth : — 
 
 You must be seeing christenings ? 
 Do you look for ale and cakes here, you rude rascals ? 
 
 (King Henry VIII., Act v. sc. 3.) 
 
 In the Merry Wives of Windsor and King Henry IV. 
 we have an example of the jolly side of tavern life — not 
 the lowest, and one often redeemed with touches of hurnour, 
 
 1 We find in Laneham's Letter (1575), Leland's Collectanea, that it 
 was the custom then, at the marriage of the humblest as well as of 
 the highest, for a "bride-cup," sometimes called a "knitting-cup," to 
 be quaffed in church. At the marriage of Philip and Mary in Win- 
 chester Cathedral in 1554, after mass was done, wine and sops w< 
 hallowed and delivered to them both. And there is another descrip- 
 tion of a real rustic wedding, when the sweet " bride-cup " attracted 
 the flies around. 
 
 J)
 
 52 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 wit, and wisdom. Act i. scene i, Merry Wives, Slender 
 says : — 
 
 Though I cannot remember what I did when you made me drunk, 
 yet I am not altogether an ass. 
 
 Falst. What say you, Scarlet and John ? 
 
 Bard. Why, sir, for my part, I say the gentleman had drunk him- 
 self out of his five sentences. 
 
 Evans. It is his five senses : fie, what the ignorance is ! 
 
 Bard. And .being fap, sir, was, as they say, cashiered ; and so con- 
 clusions passed the careers. 
 
 Slender. Ay, you spake in Latin then too ; but 'tis no matter : I'll 
 ne'er be drunk whilst I live again, but in honest, civil, godly company, 
 for this trick : if I be drunk, I'll be drunk with those that have the 
 fear of God, and not with drunken knaves. 
 
 Evans. So Got judge me, that is a virtuous mind. 
 
 Ford promises them a "pottle of burnt sack," and as 
 Mrs. Quickly said — 
 
 In such wine and sugar of the best and fairest, as would have won 
 any woman's heart. . . . 
 
 Bard. Sir John, there's one Master Brook below would fain speak 
 with you, and be acquainted with you ; and hath sent your worship a 
 morning draught of sack. 
 
 Falst. Call him in. Such Brooks are welcome to me, that o'erflow 
 such liquor. . . . 
 
 Ford. I will rather trust an Irishman with my aqua vitre bottle. 
 
 (Act ii. sc. 2.) 
 
 Host. I will to my honest Knight Falstaff, and drink canary with him. 
 Ford (aside). I think I shall drink in pipe-wine first with him. 
 
 (Act iii. sc. 2.) 
 
 Falst. Go fetch me a quart of sack : put a toast in it. Have I lived 
 to be carried in a basket ? . . . Come, let me pour in some sack to the 
 Thames water. . . . Take away these chalices : Go brew me a pottle 
 of sack finely. 
 
 Bard. With eggs, sir ? 
 
 Falst. Simple of itself ; I'll no pullet-sperm in my brewage. 
 
 (Act iii. sc. 5.) 
 
 In King Henry IV., Part 1 : — 
 Falst. Now, Hal, what time o' day is it, lad ? 

 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 53 
 
 P. Henry. Thou art so fat-witted, with drinking; of old sack, and 
 unbuttoning thee after supper, and sleeping upon benches after noon, 
 that thou hast forgotten to demand that truly which thou wouldst truly 
 know. What a devil hast thou to do with the time of day ? unless 
 hours were cups of sack. 
 
 Poins. What says Sir John Sack-and-sugar ? Jack, how agrees the 
 devil and thee about thy soul, that thou soldest him on Good Friday 
 last, for a cup of Madeira and a cold capon's leg ? . . . 
 
 Falst. Rare words, brave world ! Hostess, my breakfast come ? 
 
 O, I could wish this tavern were my drum ! (Act i. sc. 2.) 
 
 In Part II. Silence sings : — 
 
 A cup of wine that's brisk and fine, 
 And drink unto the leman mine ; 
 And a merry heart lives long-a. . . . 
 
 Shal. You'll crack a quart together. Ha ! will you not, Master 
 Bardolph 1 
 
 Bard. Yes, sir, in a pottle-pot. (Act v. sc. 3.) 
 
 The payment for these pleasures puzzled many, as it did 
 Falstaff :— 
 
 Bardolph, get thee before to Coventry ; fill me a bottle of sack. 
 Bard. Will you give me the money, captain ? 
 Falst. Lay out, lay out. 
 Bard. This bottle makes an angel. 
 
 Falst. An' if it do, take it for thy labour ; if it make twenty, take 
 them all, I'll answer the coinage. (Part I. Act iv. sc. 2.) 
 
 This aspect is also suggested in Cymbelinc. The Gaoler 
 says to Posthumus : — 
 
 A heavy reckoning for you, sir : But the comfort is, you shall be 
 called to no more payments, fear no more tavern-bills, which are often 
 the sadness of parting, as the procuring of mirth : you come in faint 
 for want of meat, depart reeling with too much drink ; sorry that you 
 have paid too much, and sorry that you are paid too much : purse and 
 brain both empty, — the brain the heavier for being too light, the purse 
 too light, being drawn of heaviness. (Act v. sc. 4.) 
 
 This light way of considering death is illustrated in 
 Measure for Measure, when the Gaoler says : — 
 
 Look you, the warrant's come.
 
 54 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Barnard. You rogue, I have been drinking all night, I am not fitted 
 for it. 
 
 Clown. O, the better, sir ; for he that drinks all night, and is 
 hanged betimes in the morning, may sleep the sounder all the next 
 day. (Act iv. sc. 3. ) 
 
 The Merry Wives of Windsor illustrates the Elizabethan 
 tapster : — 
 
 Host. I will entertain Bardolph ; he shall draw, he shall tap ; said I 
 well, bully Hector ? 
 
 Fals. Do so, mine host. 
 
 Host. I have spoke ; let him follow. Let me see thee froth and 
 lime ; I am at a word ; follow ! 
 
 Fals. Bardolph, follow him ; a tapster is a good trade ; an old 
 cloak makes a new jerkin ; a withered serving-man a fresh tapster : 
 Go, adieu. 
 
 Bar. It is a life I have desired : I will thrive. 
 
 Pistol. O, base Hungarian wight ! Wilt thou the spigot wield ? 
 
 (Act i. sc. 3.) 
 
 Steevens explains the above phrase by saying, " The beer 
 was frothed by putting soap in the tankard, and the sack 
 sparkling by lime in the glass." He does not give his 
 authority for this very peculiar recipe of the tapster's craft. 
 Shakspere, however, alludes to the habit elsewhere. 
 
 In King Henry IV., Part I., for instance, Poins asks : — 
 
 Where hast been, Hal ? 
 
 P. Henry. With three or four loggerheads, with three or four score 
 hogsheads. I am sworn brother to a leash of drawers. . . . They call 
 drinking deep, dyeing scarlet. ... To conclude, I am so good a pro- 
 ficient in one quarter of an hour, that I can drink with any tinker in 
 his own language during my life. . . . But, sweet Ned, to sweeten 
 which name of Ned I give thee this pennyworth of sugar . . . clapped 
 even now into my hand by an under-skinker ; one that never spake 
 other English in his life than "eight shillings and sixpence," and 
 "You are welcome," with this shrill addition, "Anon, anon, sir! 
 Score a pint of Bastard in the Half-moon," or so. But, Ned, to 
 drive away time till Falstaff come, I prithee do thou stand in some 
 by-room, while I question my puny drawer to what end he gave me 
 the sugar. . . . How long have you to serve, Francis ? 
 
 Fran. Forsooth, five years. . . . 
 
 P. Henry. Five years ! by'r Lady, a long lease for the clinking of
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 55 
 
 pewter. . . . Your brown bastard is your only drink : for, look you, 
 Francis, your white doublet will sully : in Barbary, sir, it cannot come 
 to so much. . . . 
 
 Fals. A plague of all cowards ! Give me a cup of sack. . . . You 
 rogue, here's lime in this sack too. . . . Yet a coward is worse than a 
 cup of sack with lime in it. . . . (Act ii. sc. 4.) 
 
 In Measure for Measure also : — 
 
 Escal. Come hither to me, Master Froth. Master Froth, I would 
 not have you acquainted with tapsters ; they will draw you, Master 
 Froth, and you will hang them. Get you gone, and let me hear no 
 more of you. 
 
 Froth. I thank your worship : For mine own part, I never come 
 into any room in a taphouse, but I am drawn in. (Act iii. sc. 1.) 
 
 In relation to the heavy drinking said to have been lately 
 imported from the Flemings and Germans by the English 
 soldiers who campaigned abroad, we may note that Mrs. 
 Pa£re calls Sir John Falstaff "the Flemish drunkard." 
 
 Also in the Merchant of Venice Nerissa asks : — 
 
 How like you the young German, the Duke of Saxony's nephew ? 
 
 Por. Very vilely in the morning, when he is sober ; and most vilely 
 in the afternoon, when he is drunk ; when he is best, he is a little 
 worse than a man : and when he is worst, he is little better than a 
 beast ; an the worst fall that ever fell, I hope I shall make shift to go 
 without hiin. 
 
 Ner. If he should offer to choose, and choose the right casket, you 
 shoidd refuse to perform your father's will, if you should refuse to 
 accept him. 
 
 Por. Therefore, for fear of the worst, I pray thee set a deep glass of 
 Rhenish wine on the contrary casket ; for, if the devil be within, and 
 that temptation without, I know he will choose it. I will do any- 
 thing, Nerissa, ere I will be married to a sponge. (Act i. sc. 2.) 
 
 But the habit seems to have been widely spread by 
 Shakspere's time, and coupled with that of "drinking 
 healths," as we see in Stubb's Anatomy. <>f Abuses and 
 Nash's Pierce Pe?iilesse's Supplication to the Devil, and in 
 Dekkar's works.
 
 56 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 For instance, in Borneo and Juliet Mercutio says Queen 
 Mab makes a soldier dream of " healths five fathom deep." 
 We may also refer to the carousals in Twelfth Night ; — 
 
 Sir Toby. These clothes are good enough to drink in, and so be these 
 boots too ! an they be not, let them hang themselves in their own 
 straps. 
 
 Mar. That quaffing and drinking will undo yon : I heard my lady 
 talk of it yesterday. . . . They add, moreover, Sir Andrew's drunk 
 nightly in your company. 
 
 Sir Toby. With drinking healths to my niece. I'll drink to her as 
 long as there is a passage in my throat, and drink in Illyria. He's a 
 coward and a coystril that will not drink to my niece till his brains 
 turn o' the toe like a parish -top. . . . 
 
 Sir Toby. Knight, thou lack'st a cup of canary ; when did I see 
 thee so put down ? 
 
 Sir Andreio. Never in your life, I think, unless you see canary put 
 me down : Methinks sometimes I have no more wit than a Christian 
 or an ordinary man has ; but I am a great eater of beef, and that does 
 harm to my wit. (Act i. sc. 2.) 
 
 Olivia. What's a drunken man like, fool ? 
 
 Clown. Like a drowned man, a fool, and a madman ; one draught 
 above heat makes him a fool : the second mads him : and a third 
 drowns him. 
 
 Olivia. Go thou and seek the crowner, and let him sit o' my coz ; for 
 he's in the third stage of drink, he's drowned : go look after him. 
 
 Clown. He is but mad yet, and the fool shall look to the madman. 
 
 (Act i. sc. 5.) 
 
 Sir Toby. A false conclusion, and I hate it as an unfilled can. . . . 
 Do not our lives consist of the four elements ? 
 
 Sir And. 'Faith, so they say ; but I think it consists rather of eat- 
 ing and drinking. 
 
 Sir Toby. Thou art a scholar : let us therefore eat and drink. 
 Marian, I say, a stoop of wine. . . . 
 
 Clown. . . . The Myrmidons are no bottle-ale houses. . . . 
 
 Mai. Do you make an alehouse of my lady's house, that ye squeak 
 out your cozier's catches without any instigation or remorse of 
 voice ? . . . 
 
 Sir Toby. Out o' time ? Sir, ye lie. Art any more than a steward ? 
 Dost thou think because thou art virtuous there shall be no more 
 cakes and ale ? . . . A stoop of wine, Maria ! . . . (Act ii. sc. 2.) 

 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 57 
 
 Sir Toby. Sot, didst see Dick Surgeon, sot ? 
 
 Cloion. Ah, he's drunk, Sir Toby, an hour agone ; his eyes were set 
 at eight this morning. 
 
 Sir Toby. Then he's a rogue and a'passy-measures pavin. I hate a 
 drunken rogue. . . . 
 
 Clown's Song. 
 But when I carne unto my bed, 
 
 With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, 
 With toss-pots still had drunken head, 
 For the rain it raineth every day. 
 
 (Act v. sc. 1.) 
 
 Shakspere does not often prophesy into a future beyond 
 his own time ; but one of these cases occurs when in King 
 Lear, Act iii. sc. 3, the Fool says : — 
 
 I'll speak a prophecy ere I go . . . 
 
 When brewers mar their malt with water . . . 
 
 Then shall the realm of Albion 
 
 Come to great confusion. 
 
 He makes Cranmer prophesy of Elizabeth at her christen- 
 ing in Westminster — 
 
 In her days every man shall eat in safety, 
 Under his own vine, what he plants : 
 
 (Henry TV//.) 
 
 which suggests a more general cultivation of the vine than 
 might have been supposed. 
 
 He notices " the vines of France " in King Lear ; also in 
 Henri/ V., Burgundy groans that the war should hurt France : 
 
 Her vine, the merry cheerer of the heart, unpruned dies . . . 
 And as our vineyards, fallows, meads, and hedges, 
 Defective in their natures, grow to wildness. 
 
 Wine is the drink of France, the trade of France. Hence 
 the French cannot appreciate ale. 
 
 Constable. Can sodden water, 
 
 A drench for sur-rein'd jades, their barley broth, 
 Decoct their cold blood to such violent heat ? 
 And shall our quick blood, spirited with wine, 
 Seem frosty ? | //. nry P., Act iii. sc. 5.)
 
 5S THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Wine also is a drink of the upper classes and of those who 
 ape them. 
 
 Mcnenius. I am known to be a humorous patrician, and one that loves 
 a cup of hot wine with not a drop of allaying Tiber in't. . . If the drink 
 you give me touch my palate adversely, I make a crooked face at it. 
 
 (Coriolanus, Act ii. sc. I.) 
 
 This distinction between ale and wine is noted in the 
 socialistic creed propounded 300 years ago by Shakspere as 
 Jack Cade. The expressions in some points are very much 
 like the present ideas of socialism among the masses, though 
 Jack Cade meant to be " king " of these masses — a good 
 king, however, who should bring in a millennium. 
 
 Cade. There shall be in England seven halfpenny loaves sold for a 
 penny : the three-hooped pot shall have ten hoops ; and I shall make 
 it felony to drink small-beer : all the realm shall be in common ; and 
 
 in Cheapside shall my palfrey go to grass There shall be no 
 
 money ; all shall eat and drink on my score. . . . [Ilenry VI., Part II. 
 Act iv. sc. 2.) 
 
 And here, sitting upon London-stone, I charge and command that, 
 at the city's cost, the conduit run nothing but claret wine this first 
 year of our reign. (Act iv. sc. 6.) 
 
 It is also illustrated in the Induction to the Taming of 
 the SJireir, where the " Wincot ale" was too much for 
 Christopher Sly : — 
 
 Sly. For God's sake, a pot of small ale. 
 
 1st Servant. Will't please your lordship drink a cup of sack ? . . . 
 
 Sly. I never drank sack in my life. . . . 
 
 Lord. Heaven cease this idle humour in your honour. . . . 
 
 Sly. Am not I Christopher Sly, 1 old Sly's son of Burton Heath, by 
 birth a pedlar, by education a cardmaker, by transmutation a bear- 
 herd, and now, by present profession, a tinker. Ask Marian Hacket, 
 the fat ale-wife of Wincot, if she know me not : if she say I am not 
 fourteen-pence on the score for sheer ale, score me up for the lyingest 
 knave in Christendom. 
 
 Lord. Thou art a lord, and nothing but a lord. . . . 
 
 1 Sly and Burton Heath, as well as Hacket and Wincot, are real 
 local names.
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 59 
 
 Sly. I do not sleep ; I see, I hear, I speak. 
 Upon my life, I am a lord indeed. 
 And once again, a pot o' the smallest ale. . . . 
 
 Sen: These fifteen years you have been in a dream, 
 Or when thou waked, so waked as if you slept. 
 
 Sly. These fifteen years ? By my fay, a goodly nap — 
 But did I never speak of all that time ? 
 
 Serv. Ah yes, my lord, but very idle words — 
 For though you lay here in this goodly chamber, 
 Yet would ye say ye were beaten out of doors, 
 And rail upon the hostess of the house, 
 And say you would present her at the leet 1 
 Because she brought stone jugs and no sealed quarts. 
 
 We also see the social distinction of the quality of the 
 drink noted in King Henry IV., Part II. Act ii. sc. 2 : — 
 
 P. Henry. Doth it not show vilely in me to desire small-beer ? 
 
 Poins. Why, a prince should not be so loosely studied as to remem- 
 ber so weak a composition. 
 
 P. Henry. Belike, then, my appetite was not princely got, for in 
 truth I do remember the poor creature, small-beer. . . . 
 
 As Shakspere makes the beer-drinking English beat the 
 wine-drinking French, so he makes the beer-drinking 
 English beat the wine-drinking English in the judicial 
 combat : — 
 
 1st Neigh. Here, Neighbour Horner, I drink to you in a cup of sack ; 
 and fear not, neighbour, you shall do well enough. 
 
 2nd Neigh. And here, neighbour, here's a cup of charneco. 
 
 T,rd Neigh. And here's a pot of good double beer, neighbour : and 
 fear not your man. 
 
 Horner. Let it come, i'faith, and I'll pledge you all : and a fig for 
 Peter ! . . . 
 
 1st Prcnt. Here, Peter, I drink to thee, and be not afraid. 
 
 2nd Prent. Be merry, Peter, and fear not thy master ; fight for the 
 credit of apprentices. 
 
 1 At the leet or court-leet of a manor, the jury presented those who 
 used false weights and measures, and amongst others, those who, like 
 the " fat alewife of Wincot," used jugs of irregular capacity instead of 
 the sealed and licensed quarts.
 
 60 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Peter. I thank you all : drink and pray for me, I pray you ; for, I 
 think I have taken my last draught in this world 
 
 York. Take away his weapon : Fellow ! thank God and the good 
 wine in thy master's way. (King Henry VI., Part II. Act ii. sc. 4.) 
 
 The only two characters who emphatically drink water 
 instead of wine are Adam, in As You Like It: — 
 
 Though I look old, yet am I strong and lusty, 
 
 For in my youth I never did apply 
 
 Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood (Act ii. sc. 3), 
 
 And Apemantus in Timon : — 
 
 Ay, to see meat fill knaves and wine heat fools. . . . 
 If I were a huge man, I should fear to] drink at meals 
 Lest they should spy my windpipe's dangerous notes : 
 Great men should drink with harness on their throats. 
 
 Tim. My lord, in heart : and let the health go round. 
 
 Lord. Let it flow this way, my good lord. 
 
 Apem. Flow this way ? 
 A brave fellow ! He keeps his tides well. 
 Those healths will make thee and thy state look ill, Timon. 
 Here's that which is too weak to be a sinner, 
 Honest water, which ne'er left man i' the mire ; 
 This and my food are equals ; there's no odds, 
 Feasts are too proud to give thanks to the gods. 
 
 (Act i. sc. I, 2.) 
 
 The only real " praise of wine " he puts in the mouth 
 of Falstaff :— 
 
 This same young sober-blooded boy doth not love me : nor a man 
 cannot make him laugh ; but that's no marvel, he drinks no wine. 
 There's never any of these demure boys come to any proof ; for their 
 drink doth so over-cool their blood. ... A good sherris-sack hath a 
 twofold operation in it. It ascends me into the brain ; dries me there 
 all the foolish, and dull and crudy vapours which environ it, makes it 
 apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble, fiery, delectable shapes ; 
 which, delivered o'er to the voice (the tongue), which is the birth, 
 becomes excellent wit. The second property of your excellent sherris 
 is the warming of the blood, which, before cold and settled, left the 
 liver white and pale, which is the badge of pusillanimity and cowardice ;
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE, 61 
 
 but the sherris warms it, and makes it course from the inwards to the 
 parts extreme. It illumineth the face, which as a beacon gives warn- 
 ing to the rest of this little kingdom, man, to arm : and then the vital 
 commoners, and inland petty spirits, muster me all to their captain, 
 the heart ; who, great and puffed up with this retinue, doth any deed 
 of courage ; and this valour comes of sherris : so that skill in the 
 weapon is nothing without sack ; for that sets it awork ; and learning 
 a mere hoard of gold kept by a devil ; till sack commences it, and sets 
 it in act and use. Hereof comes it that Prince Henry is valiant, for 
 the cold blood he did naturally inherit of his father, he hath, like lean, 
 sterile, and bare land, manured, husbanded, and tilled, with excellent 
 endeavour of drinking good, and good store of fertile sherris ; that he 
 is become very hot and valiant. If I had a thousand sons, the prin- 
 ciple I would teach them should be to forswear thin potations, and to 
 addict themselves to sack. {Henry IV., Part II. Act iv. sc. 3.) 
 
 He certainly lived up to his creed in the use of wine, 
 but the wine lived not up to his ideas of the making a man 
 of him, and his cowardice gives a whole " Morality " in 
 his one character. Prince Henry, when imitating his 
 father in giving his opinion of Falstaff, said : — 
 
 Why dost thou converse with that huge trunk of humours. . . . 
 That bombard of sack. . . . Wherein is he good but to taste sack and 
 drink it ? . . . 
 
 Then in the scene where Prince Henry picks his 
 pockets : — 
 
 Let's see what they be — read his papers. 
 
 Poins. Item, a capon, 2s. 2d. ; Item, sauce, 4d. ; Item, sack, two 
 gallons, 5s. 8d. ; anchovies and sack after supper, 2s. 6d. ; Item, bread 
 a halfpenny. Ob. 
 
 P. Henry. monstrous ! But one halfpenny-worth of bread to this 
 intolerable deal of sack ! {Henry /I'., Part I. Act ii. sc. 4.) 
 
 The general impression given is, that people thought 
 that wine, in the first instance, filled /he veins with I>I<><,i(, as 
 in Pericles Thaisa says to her suitor : — 
 
 The King, my father, sir, hath drunk to you . . . 
 Wishing it so much blood unto your life.
 
 62 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Per. I thank both him and you, and pledge him freely. 
 
 {Pericles, Act ii. sc. 3.) 
 
 Mcncnius. He was not taken well, he had not dined, 
 The veins unfilled, our blood is cold, and then 
 We pout upon the morning, are unapt 
 To give or to forgive ; but when we have stuffed 
 These pipes and these conveyances of our blood, 
 With wine and feeding, we have suppler souls 
 Than in our priest-like fasts. (Coriolanus, Act v. sc. 1.) 
 
 That it acts medicinally ; see the Tempest, when Stephano 
 finds Caliban : — 
 
 If he have never drunk wine afore, it will go near to remove his fit, 
 if I can recover him, and keep him tame . . . Here is that which will 
 give language to you. (Act ii. sc. 2.) 
 
 s 
 
 I am weary — yea, my memory is tired ; 
 
 Have we no wine here ? (Coriolanus, Act i. sc. 9.) 
 
 I will see what physic the tavern affords. 
 
 (Henry VI., Act ii. sc. 3.) 
 
 That it heats the blood, as in King Henry VIII. : — 
 
 Sands. The red wine first must rise 
 In their fair cheeks, my lord, then we shall have them 
 Talk us to silence. (Act i. sc. 4.) 
 
 In Troilus and Cressida Achilles says : — 
 
 I'll heat his blood with Greekish wine to-night, 
 
 Which with my scimitar I'll cool to-morrow. 
 
 Patroclus, let us.feast him to the height. (Act v. sc. I.) 
 
 That it fires the face ; the effect on Bardolph's complexion 
 illustrates this : — 
 
 P. Henri/. O villain, thou stolest a cup of sack eighteen years ago, 
 and wert taken with the manner, and ever since thou hast blushed 
 extempore. (Henry IV., Part I. Act ii. sc. 4.) 
 
 Fed. The fiend hath pricked down Bardolph 1 irrecoverably, and his 
 fate is Lucifer's private kitchen, where he doth nothing but roast malt 
 worms. (Part II. Act ii. sc. 4.) 
 
 Bardolph and Fluellen are names found in Stratford records.
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 63 
 
 'Tis in the nose of thee, Bardolph. Thou art the knight of the 
 burning lamp. . . . Thou art a perpetual triumph, an everlasting 
 bonfire light. Thou hast saved me a thousand marks in links and 
 torches walking with thee in the night between tavern and tavern : 
 but the sack that thou hast drunk me would have bought me lights as 
 good cheap at the dearest chandler's in Europe. 1 
 
 (Part I. Act iii. sc. 3.) 
 
 That it fevers the heart : — 
 
 Charm. I had rather heat my liver with drinking. 
 
 {Ant. and Cleo., Act i. sc. 2.) 
 
 Timon says : — 
 
 Go suck the subtle juice o' the grape 
 
 Till the high fever seethe your blood to froth, 
 
 And so 'scape hanging. (Act iv. sc. 3.) 
 
 Thus it makes some natures bold, like Lady Macbeth's ; 
 and by just a turn in the scale this courage develops into 
 quarrelsomeness and murderousness : — 
 
 Fluellen. Alexander in his rages, and his furies, and his cholers, 
 and his moods, and his displeasures, and his indignations, and also 
 being a little intoxicated in his prains, did, in his ales and his angers, 
 look you, kill his pest friend, Clytus. 
 
 {King Henry V., Act iv. sc. 7.) 
 
 That it drowns the reason. — Macbeth's grooms sink in 
 " swinish sleep." 
 
 Lady M. . . . His two chamberlains 
 Will I with wine and wassail so convince, 
 That memory, the warder of the brain, 
 Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason 
 A limbeck only. (Macbeth, Act i. sc. 7.) 
 
 A senator says of his friend to Alcibiades : — 
 
 He's a sworn rioter ; he has a .sin 
 
 That often drowns him and takes his valour prisoner. 
 
 If there were no foes, that were enough 
 
 To overcome him : in that beastly fury 
 
 1 See Deckar's Wonderful Year, 1603.
 
 64 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 He has been known to commit outrages 
 And cherish factions ; 'tis inferred to us 
 His days are foul and his drink dangerous. 
 
 ( 7 'imon, Act iii. sc. 5.) 
 
 Macbeth's porter considers "drink is a great provoker of 
 three evil things; " and though "drink gave him the lie 
 last night," " he requited him for his lie, and made a shift 
 to cast him." 
 
 And finally degrades the man. — The play of Anton]/ and 
 Cleopatra shows the degrading power of habitual intoxi- 
 cation on noble natures. Enobarbus says the fortunes of 
 all shall be " drunk to bed." Caesar says of Antony : — 
 
 He fishes, drinks, and wastes the lamps of night in revel. . . . He 
 sits and keeps the turn of tippling with a slave, and reels the streets at 
 noon. . . . Antony, leave thy lascivious wassails. 
 
 Eno. Ay, sir, we did sleep day out of countenance, and made the 
 night light with drinking. (Act ii. sc. 2.) 
 
 Even Cleopatra shows her scorn : — 
 
 And next morn 
 Ere the ninth hour I drunk him to his bed, 
 Then put my tires and mantles on him, whilst 
 I wore his sword Philippan. 
 
 The banquet in Act ii. scene 7, is a sermon on temper- 
 ance, with the moral of the fates of the guests. Menas 
 tells Pompey, " Thou art, if thou darest be, the earthly 
 Jove." 
 
 Men. For my part, I am sorry it is turned to a drinking. Pompey 
 doth this day laugh away his fortune. 
 
 Pompey. . . . Desist and drink. 
 
 Eno. . . . Here's to thee, Menas. . . . 
 
 Pompey. Fill till the cup be hid. 
 
 Eno. There's a strong fellow, Menas. 
 
 Men. Why? 
 
 Eno. 'A bears the third part of the world. Man, seest not ? 
 
 Men. The third part then is drunk. Would it were all, that it 
 might go on wheels. 
 
 Eno. Prink thou, increase the reels.
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 65 
 
 Pomp. This is not yet an Alexandrian feast. 
 Ant. It ripens towards it. Strike the vessels, ho ! 
 Here is to Caesar. 
 
 Ccesar. I could well forbear it. 
 
 It is monstrous labour, when I wash my brain 
 And it grows fouler. ... I had rather fast 
 From all, four days, than drink so much in one. . . . 
 
 . . . Gentle lords, let's part. 
 You see we have burnt our cheeks : strong Enobarbus 
 Is weaker than the wine ; and mine own tongue 
 Splits what it speaks ; the wild disguise hath almost 
 Anticked us all. 
 
 Eno. Shall we dance now the Egyptian Bacchanals 
 And celebrate our drink ? 
 
 Pomp. Let's ha't, good soldier ! 
 Ant. Come, let us all take hands ; 
 Till that the conquering wine hath steeped our sense 
 In soft and delicate Lethe. 
 
 Eno. All take hands ; 
 
 Make battery to our ears with the loud music 
 The while I'll place you. Then the boy shall sing. 
 The holding every man shall bear, as loud 
 As his strong sides can volley. 
 
 Come, thou monarch of the vine, 
 riumpy Bacchus with pink eyne. 
 In thy vats our cares are drowned ; 
 With thy grapes our hairs are crowned ; 
 Cup us, till the world go round ; 
 Cup us, till the world go round ! 
 
 Pompey dropped out; Antony still followed the same 
 
 life. In Act iv. scene 9, Antony cried : — 
 
 Come, 
 Let's have one other gaudy night ; call to me 
 All my sad captains ; fill our bowls ; once more 
 Let's mock the midnight bell. . . . 
 Scant not my cups, and make as much of me 
 As when mine empire was your fellow, too, 
 And suffered my command. . . . Let's to supper conic, 
 And drown consideration. 
 
 And so the end was wrought, and hence came Cleo's 
 prophecy : —
 
 66 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 The quick comedians 
 Extemporally will stage us, and present 
 Our Alexandrian revels : Antony 
 Shall be brought drunken forth. . . . Now no more 
 The juice of Egypt's grape shall moist this lip. 
 
 (Act v. sc. 2. ) 
 
 And thus these great lives ended. The metaphysic 
 tendency of Shakspere's mind leads him to sad and solemn 
 thoughts of the carelessness of man, of the shortness of 
 life, the evanescence of glory, the dominance of the Unseen. 
 Man perceives not the real and the permanent; he drops 
 the reality to pursue shadows ; after all, all men are like 
 drinkers at a banquet. Sad as he leaves us in the sunset 
 of the earthly glory of Antony, there is even a greater 
 sadness written in Othello in the fate of Cassio. For with 
 him it was not a frequent habit, nor even a natural 
 inclination, but an insidious temptation ; he suffered, not 
 for a course of riotous living, but for one false step, and he 
 dragged down with him other good and pure lives. In 
 Othello there is another " revel," a Cyprian banquet (Act 
 ii. sc. 3) :— 
 
 lago. Come, lieutenant, I have a stoop of wine ; and here without 
 are a brace of Cyprus gallants, that would fain have a measure to the 
 health of black Othello. 
 
 Cassio. Not to-night, good lago ; I have very poor and unhappy 
 brains for drinking. I could well wish courtesy would invent some 
 other custom of entertainment. 
 
 lago. O ! they are our friends ; but one cup. I'll drink for you. 
 
 Cassio. I have drunk but one cup to-night, and that was craftily 
 qualified, too, and behold what innovation it makes here : I am un- 
 fortunate in the infirmity, and dare not tax my weakness with any 
 more. . . . 
 
 lago. If I can fasten but one cup upon him, 
 With that which he hath drunk to-night already, 
 He'll be as full of quarrel and offence 
 As my young mistress' dog. Now, my sick fool Roderigo, 
 Whom love has turned almost the wrong side out, 
 To Desdemona has to-night caroused 
 Potations pottle-deep ; and he's to watch :
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 67 
 
 Three lads of Cyprus — noble swelling spirits — 
 
 Have I to-night flustered with flowing cups ; 
 
 And they watch too. Now, 'mongst this flock of drunkards 
 
 Am I to put my Cassio. 
 
 Cassio. 'Fore heaven, they have given me a rouse already. 
 
 Mon. Good faith, a little one ; not past a pint, as I am a soldier. 
 
 Iago. Some wine, hoa ! 
 
 And let the canakin clink, clink, 
 
 And let the canakin clink ; 
 A soldier's a man, a man's life's but a span, 
 Why, then, let a soldier drink. 
 Some wine, boys. 
 
 Cassio. Tore heaven, an excellent song. 
 
 Iago. I learned it in England, where, indeed, they are most potent 
 in potting ; your Dane, your German, and your swag-bellied Hollander 
 — Drink, hoa ! — are nothing to your English. 
 
 Cas. Is your Englishman so exquisite in his drinking ? 
 
 Iago Why, he drinks you, with facility, your Dane dead 
 
 drunk ; he sweats not to overthrow your Almain ; he gives your Hol- 
 lander a vomit ere the next pottle can be filled. 
 
 Cassio. To the health of oar general. 
 
 Iago. Some wine, hoa ! . . . 
 
 Cassio. Do not think, gentlemen, I am drunk ; this is my ancient — 
 I can stand well enough, I can speak well enough. . . . 
 
 Iago. You see this fellow that is gone before, 
 He is a soldier fit to stand by Caesar 
 And give direction : and do but see his vice ; 
 'Tis to his virtue a just equinox, 
 The one as long as the other ; 'tis a pity of him. 
 I fear the trust Othello puts him in 
 On some odd time of his infirmity, 
 Will shake this island. . . . 
 
 Then, after tempting him, Iago leads the excited Cassio 
 to quarrel with the excited lloderigo, taking care that wit- 
 nesses are prepared to carry the news to Othello. 31 can- 
 while, Cassio is sobered, and horrified by being told ho is 
 " drunk," and by seeing Othello approach : — 
 
 Iago. What, are you hurt, lieutenant ? 
 Cassio. Ay, past all surgery. 
 . Many, ikaven forbid !
 
 6S THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Cassio. Reputation, reputation, reputation ! 0, I have lost my 
 reputation ! I have lost the immortal part, sir, of myself, and what 
 remains is bestial. My reputation, lago, my reputation ! 
 
 lago. As I am an honest man, I thought you had received some 
 bodily wound ; there is more offence in that than in reputation. . . . 
 
 Cassio. I will rather sue to be despised than to deceive so good a 
 commander with so slight, so drunken, so indiscreet an officer. Drunk ? 
 and speak parrot, and squabble ? swagger ? and swear ? and discourse 
 fustian with one's own shadow ? 0, thou invisible spirit of wine, if 
 thou hast no name to be known by, let us call thee devil ! . . . 
 
 layo. What had he done to you ? 
 
 Cassio. I remember a mass of things, but nothing distinctly : a 
 quarrel, but nothing wherefore. 0, that men should put an enemy in 
 their mouths to steal away their brains ; that we should, with joy, 
 pleasure, revel, and applause, transform ourselves into beasts. 
 
 lago. Why, but you are now well enough : How came you to be 
 recovered '? 
 
 Cassio. It hath pleased the devil drunkenness, to give place to the 
 devil wrath : one imperfectness shows me another, to make me frankly 
 despise myself. 
 
 lago. Come, you are too severe a moraler : As the time, the place, 
 and the condition of this country stands, I could heartily wish this had 
 not befallen ; but since it is as it is, mend it for your own good. 
 
 Cassio. I will ask him for my place again ; he shall tell me I am a 
 drunkard ! Had I as many mouths as Hydra, such an answer would 
 stop them all. To be now a sensible man, by and by a fool, presently 
 a beast ! O strange ! — Every inordinate cup is unblessed, and the in- 
 gredient is a devil. 
 
 It i go. Come, come, good wine is a good familiar creature, if it be 
 well used ; exclaim no more against it. And, good lieutenant, I think 
 you think I love you ? 
 
 Cassio. I have well approved it, sir. I ? drunk ? 
 
 lago. You, or any man living, may be drunk at a time, man. . . . 
 
 lago, like Mephistopheles, attempts to harden his con- 
 science. Desdeniona, like the angels, pardoning his fault, 
 would remove his penalty : — 
 
 And yet his trespass, in our common reason 
 
 (Save that, they say, the wars must make examples 
 
 Out of their best), is not almost a fault 
 
 To incur a private check. (Act iii. sc. 3.) 
 
 Though there is a good deal said about wine in the
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 69 
 
 Tempest, it illustrates no great question. And in the 
 Masque, Ceres is addressed as the bounteous lady who 
 spreads the rich leas with wheat, rye, barley, and pole- 
 clipped vineyards. 
 
 Trinculo echoes Falstaff, " Was there ever a man a 
 coward that drank so much sack as I to-day 1 " 
 
 The death-scene in Hamlet represents his uncle follow- 
 ing the classic usage of throwing a pearl into the cup to 
 honour a special guest, to conceal the poison : — 
 
 Set me the stoups of wine upon that table. 
 The king shall drink to Hamlet's better breath ; 
 And in the cup an union shall he throw. . . . 
 Stay, give me drink : Hamlet, this pearl is thine ; 
 Here's to thy health. Give him the cup. 
 
 Queen. The queen carouses to thy fortune, Hamlet. 
 
 The result of my reading is to make me believe that 
 Shakspere approved of stimulant in exceeding moderation ; 
 that he preferred beer to wine ; and that, even when drink- 
 ing immoderately, it was better to drink beer than wine. 
 In spite of Falstaff 's praise, the series of quotations I have 
 given show that the evils of excessive drinking chiefly 
 came through the use of "wine" — the Irishman's aqua 
 vitas being little known. All his characters that came to 
 evil through drink (like Edgar in King Lear), " Wine 
 loved they dearly." He never blames that "poor creature, 
 small-beer." 
 
 Another important consideration beyond the psycho- 
 logical in regard to the discussion is, that in treating the 
 drinking-customs of different peoples or ancient times — 
 for instance, in King Lear, Antony and Cleopatra, Hamlet, 
 Sec. — Shakspere commits anachronisms and incongruities 
 impossible to such a thorough student of history and 
 literature as was Bacon, and yet these very errors were in 
 keeping with the canons of dramatic art at the time, of 
 which Bacon disapproved. 
 
 The reading of Bacon's works gives very different results.
 
 70 THE BACON-SFIAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 I will first notice the differing lists of phrases in regard to 
 various stimulants that Bacon uses. Of course there are 
 some similar ones. Contemporaries must always retain a 
 partial identity in language. But we have only to compare 
 the list at the head of this chapter with the present one, 
 to see the distinction. Nat. Hist.: — " Hippocras liquor," 
 " Claret wine," " Quart of vinegar,'' " Must of wine," " Wort 
 of beer," " Wine burnt," " Infusions," " Kernels of grapes," 
 " Capon-beer," " Kilderkin," " Bung-hole," " Beer-carding," 
 "Flowering," "Mantling," "The like brew," "Acceleration 
 of germination," " More splendour in the liquor," "More 
 lustre," "Turbid," "Refined," "Racked," " Unracked," 
 "New beer," "Stale beer," "Lees," "Malt infusion," 
 "Hops," "Maturation," "Bottling of beer and ale," 
 " Goodness of waters for brewing," " Strong waters," 
 "Steeped wines and beers are very medicinal," "The dul- 
 coration of malt," "Potable drinks," "Mead,' ; "Cyder," 
 "Perry," "Verjuice," "Malmsey," "Greek wine," "Canary 
 wine," "Sweet wines," "In September grapes," "Wine- 
 pi'ess," " Harsh-wine, tasting of the grape-stone," " Distilla- 
 tions," "Hot water," "Alehouse glass." " English drinking- 
 
 glass. 
 
 In Bacon's Medical Remain*, in which the "advice" 
 seems to have been more practised on himself than on others, 
 we can notice his notion of the value of mixtures in his 
 "Wine for the spirits," "Wine a gainst melancholy," "Wine 
 with swine's flesh or hart's flesh," " Ale of the second infu- 
 sion of the vine of the oak," " Ale of raisins, dactyles, pota- 
 toes, pistachios, hour v, t ragacai it h, mastic," " To use ale with 
 enula campana, carduus, germander, sage, angelica seed, 
 cresses," "Vino odorato," " Wine in which gold has been 
 quenched," " Rhubarb in white wine or beer." 
 
 Prom his position, as well as from his mission, he was able 
 to learn much of this subject, and ho was, in several pecu- 
 liar ways, connected with "the trade." His friend Essex, 
 according to Queen Elizabeth's own profession, fell through
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 71 
 
 his urgency in desiring a renewal of the farm of sweet wines. 
 In James's reign, Bacon arranged the settlement of this 
 monopoly on the Lady Arabella. At his own fall, the 
 twenty-seventh charge brought against him was that he 
 had been bribed by the French merchants to force their 
 wines upon unwilling London vintners, by putting their per- 
 sons illegally in prison. Another charge was that he had 
 accepted bribes from three parties, when the Company of 
 Apothecaries separated from the Grocers. Previously to 
 this, he had not been considered free of blame in allowing 
 Christopher Villiers, the brother of the Duke of Bucking- 
 ham, to oppress the keepers of alehouses by extortions and 
 fines, in his monopoly of licensing powers. 
 
 In his purely intellectual relations to the subject he is 
 more honourably known. In his "Advice to Sir George 
 Villiers," regaining home industries, he notes : " First, for 
 the home trade, I first commend unto your consideration 
 the encouragement of tillage, which will enable the king- 
 dom to bring forth corn for the natives. . . . Third, plant- 
 ing of orchards, in a soil and air fit for them, is very 
 profitable as well as pleasurable ; cyder and perry are 
 notable beverages in sea-voyages. . . . Fifth, the planting 
 of hop-yards are found very profitable , for the planters." 
 Not only did he give political counsel to those in power, 
 but he gave scientific counsel to those in practice, which, 
 though occasionally confused by superstition and credulity, 
 was wonderfully sound and suggestive, considering the state 
 of advancement in his time. He first showed the dignity 
 of dietetics. "Among the particular arts, those are to be 
 preferred which exhibit, alter, and prepare natural bodies 
 and materials of things, such as agriculture, cooking, and 
 chemistry" (Parasceve, v., and elsewhere). 
 
 lie notices the paucity of technical literature, and 
 suggests "A Catalogue of Particular Histories that ought 
 to be Written." 55. " History of the Food of Man, and of 
 all Things Eatable and Drinkable, and of all Diet ; and of
 
 72 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 the variety of the same according to nations and smaller 
 differences. 83. History of Wine. 84. History of the 
 Cellar and of different Kinds of Drinks. 12S. Miscel- 
 laneous History of Common Experiments that have not 
 yet been raised into an Art." These histories many are 
 now helping this great suggestor to complete ; these 
 experiments that he begun many have kept working 
 out. In his Advancement of Learning, Book ii., he 
 says : " For history of Nature, wrought or mechanical, 
 I find some collections made of agriculture, and likewise 
 of manual arts, but commonly with a rejection of experi- 
 ments familiar and vulgar. For it is esteemed a kind 
 of dishonour unto learning to descend to inquiry or 
 meditation upon matters mechanical," except they be such 
 as may be thought secrets, rarities, and special subtilties." 
 Bacon thereupon, by example as well as by precept, went 
 on to show the value of " experiments familiar and vulgar." 
 Wo may consider a few of these in relation to our subjects. 
 He suggests the soaking of corn seeds in various liquids 
 before planting (Nat. Hist, c. v. 402), and gives the experi- 
 ments he performed himself. After the corn has grown, 
 " winds are injurious to the corn crops at three seasons — 
 namely, on the opening of the flower, at the shedding of the 
 flower, and near the time of ripening ; " and he gives the 
 reasons of this (Hist, of Winds, 24). He advises men to 
 inquire more into the diseases of corn (Nat. Hist., c. vii. 
 669, 696, 670). He notices the importance of "waters" 
 in making malt, &c, in Nat. Hid., c. iv. 391, 392, 393; 
 and in 394 he adds : " Fourthly, try them by making 
 drinks stronger or smaller with the same quantity of malt ; 
 and you may conclude that that water which maketh the 
 stronger drink is the more concocted and nourishing, though 
 perhaps it be not so good for medicinal use. Such water is 
 commonly the water of large and navigable rivers, or of 
 large and clean ponds of standing water, for upon both 
 them the sun hath more power than upon fountains and
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 73 
 
 small rivers. And I conceive that chalk water is next them, 
 the best for going furthest in drink, for that also helpeth 
 concoction." Nat. Hist., c. vii. 647, he notes that " Barley, 
 as appeareth in the malting, being steeped in water three 
 days, and afterwards the water drained from it, and the 
 barley turned upon a dry floor, will sprout half an inch long 
 at least, and if it be let alone and not turned, much more, 
 until the heart be out." 648. " Malt in the drenching will 
 swell, and that in such a manner as, after the putting forth 
 in sprouts and the drying upon the kiln, there will be 
 gained at least a bushel in eight ; and yet the sprouts are 
 rubbed off ; and there will be a bushel of dust besides the 
 malt, which I suppose to be not only by the loose and open 
 lying of the parts, but by some addition of substance from 
 the water." In Nat. Hist., c. ix. 857, he tells us " Barley 
 in the boiling swelleth not much, wheat swelleth more, rice 
 extremely," and gives the reasons. 649. " Malt gathereth 
 a sweetness to the taste, which appeareth yet more in the 
 wort. The dulcoration of things is worthy to be tried to 
 the full ; for that dulcoration importeth a degree to the 
 nourishment," and the making of things inalimental to 
 become alimental, may be an experiment of great profit 
 for making new victual." 
 
 In Nat. Hist., c. i. 49 : " Indian maize hath of certain 
 an excellent spirit of nourishment ; I judge the same of 
 rice." 24. " In the same way, if beer were to bo brewed 
 not only of the grains of wheat, barley, oats or peas, but 
 should likewise have about a third part of roots or fat 
 pulps, as potato roots, the pith of artichokes, burdocks, or 
 any other sweet and esculent roots, I conceive it would be 
 a drink much more conducive to longevity than beer made 
 of grain." It is evident that the modern definition of 
 "pure beer" had not then arisen as a standard on a 
 battle-field. 
 
 In the History of Dense and Rare he treats of must : 
 " New beer, and the like, when cashed, swell and rise
 
 74 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 exceedingly, so that, unless they obtain a vent, they will 
 burst the cask ; but if this be given them, they rise and 
 froth up, and, as it were, boil over." He gives a whole 
 series of experiments on beer. 
 
 In the same way he treats of wine from the beginning. 
 Nat. Hist., c. vii. 668 : " The grafting of vines upon vines, 
 as I take it, is not now in use ; the ancients had it, and 
 had three ways; the first was incision, which is the 
 ordinary manner of grafting ; the second was terebration 
 through the middle of the stock, and putting in the scions 
 there ; and the third was paring of two vines that grew 
 together to the marrow, and binding them close." 
 
 Nat. Hist., c. i. 35, is "On making vines fruitful. It 
 is reported of credit, that if you lay good store of kernels 
 of grapes about the root of a vine, it will make the vine 
 come earlier and prosper better. The cause may be, for 
 that the kernels draw out of the earth juice fit to nourish 
 the tree, as those that would be trees of themselves, though 
 there were no root ; but the root, being of greater strength, 
 robbeth and devoureth the nourishment when they have 
 drawn it." And in c. v. 457 : " It is reported that trees 
 will grow greater and bear better fruit if you put lees of 
 wine to the root." 
 
 In Nat. Hint., c. vii. 63S : " As for the vine, it is noted 
 that it beareth more grapes when it is young, but grapes 
 that make better wine when it is old ; for that the juice is 
 better concocted, and we see that some wine is inflammable, 
 so as it hath a kind of oiliness." 
 
 664. " Showers, if they come a little before the ripening 
 of fruits, do good to vines, but it is rather for plenty than 
 for goodness, for the best vines are in the driest vintages." 
 666. " It is strange which is observed by some of the 
 ancients, that dust keepeth the fruitfulness of vines, inso- 
 much as they cast dust upon them of purpose. It should 
 seem that that powdering, when a shower cometh, maketh 
 a kind of soiling to the tree, being earth and water finely
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 75 
 
 laid on. And they note that countries where the fields 
 and ways are dusty bear the best wines." 
 
 Next after his favourite scents of violets and musk-roses 
 and decaying strawberry leaves, he prefers the scent of the 
 vine-flower, and suggests utilising it in wine. 
 
 He notices in his essay Of Judicature (L. vi.), "Where 
 the wine-press is hard wrought, it yields a harsh wine, 
 that tastes of the grape -stone." 
 
 In De Augmentu Scientiarum (L. v.) he speaks of cider, 
 &c, " According to the Roman adage, ' One cluster of grapes 
 ripens faster by the side of another.'" . . . "Our cycler 
 makers have an excellent way of imitating the operation. 
 For they take care not to bruise or squeeze the apples till they 
 have lain together for awhile in heaps, and so ripened by 
 mutual contact, that the too great acidity of the drink may 
 be corrected." This fact is repeated, like most of the other 
 facts that interest him, several times in his writings ; and 
 he certainly was much interested in cider, as also in perry. 
 
 Yet he does not ignore mead. In the History of Life 
 and Death, Part ii. 22 : "Mead, I imagine, would not be 
 bad if strong and old ; but since all honey has some acidity 
 in it (as may be seen by the corrosive water that the 
 chemists extract from it, which can even dissolve metals), 
 it would be better to make a similar drink with sugar, not 
 lightly infused, but incorporated as firmly as honey in 
 mead, and keep it for a year or six months, so that the 
 water may lose its crudity, and the sugar may acquire 
 subtlety. " 
 
 Experiment solitary touching honey and sugar, Nat. Hid., 
 848 : " Sugar hath put down the use of honey, insomuch as 
 we have lost those observations and preparations of honey 
 which the ancients had, when it was more in price. First, 
 it seemeth that there was in old time tree-honey as well as 
 bee-honey, which was the tear or blood issuing from the 
 tree ; insomuch as one of the ancients relateth that in 
 Trebisond there was honey issuing from the box-trees,
 
 76 THE BACOX-SHAKSPERE QUESTIOX. 
 
 which made men mad. Again, in ancient time there was 
 a kind of honey which, either of its own nature or by art, 
 would grow as hard as sugar, and was not so luscious as 
 ours. They had also a wine of honey which they made 
 thus. They crushed the honey into a great quantity of 
 water, and then strained the liquor : after they boiled it in 
 a copper to the half; then they poured it into earthen 
 vessels for a small time, and after turned it into vessels of 
 wood, and kept it for many years. They have also at this 
 day, in Russia and those Northern countries, mead simple, 
 which, well made and seasoned, is a good wholesome drink, 
 and very clear. They use also in "Wales a compound drink 
 of mead with herbs and spices. But meanwhile it were 
 good, in recompense of that we have lost in honey, there 
 were brought in use a sugai'-mead ; for so we may call it, 
 though without any mixture at all of honey; and to brew 
 it, and keep it stale, as they use mead : for certainly, though 
 it would not be so abstersive, and opening, and solutive a 
 drink as mead, } 7 et it will be more grateful to the stomach, 
 and more lenitive, and fit to be used in sharp diseases : for 
 we see that the use of sugar in beer and ale hath good 
 effects in such cases." 
 
 He speaks about the nourishment in odours, and sug- 
 gests pouring wine on new-turned earth and inhaling it 
 as a thing nourishing and pleasant. " It is certain that 
 odours do, in a small degree, nourish, especially the odour 
 of wine," and he gives the case of Democritus (Nat. Hist., 
 
 934)- 
 
 He advised people to inhale the odours of newly-turned 
 earth. " I commend also sometimes in digging of new 
 earth to pour in some Malmsey or Greek wine, that the 
 vapour of the earth and wine together may comfort the 
 spirits the more" (Nat. Hist., c. x. 928). 
 
 He does not forget the various steps in finishing any 
 drink. Nat. Hist., c. iii. 308: "The longer malt or herbs 
 or the like are infused in liquor, the more thick and troubled
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 77 
 
 the liquor is ; but the longer they be decocted in the liquor, 
 the clearer it is. The reason is plain, because in infusion 
 the longer it is, the greater is the part of the gross body 
 that goeth into the liquor ; but in decoction, though more 
 goeth forth, yet it either purgeth at the top or settleth at 
 the bottom. And therefore the most exact way to clarify 
 is first to infuse, and then to take off the liquor and decoct 
 it, as they do in beer, which hath malt first infused in the 
 liquor, and is afterwards boiled with the hop. This is re- 
 ferred to separation." 
 
 In Nat. Hist., c. iv. 301, he goes on to the clarification 
 of liquors : " Liquors are many of them at the first thick 
 and troubled, as must, wort, juices of fruits, or herbs ex- 
 pressed, and by time they settle and clarify. But to make 
 them clear before the time is great work ; for it is a spur 
 to Nature, and putteth her out of her pace ; and besides, it 
 is of good use for making drinks and sauces potable and 
 serviceable speedily. But to know the means of accele- 
 rating clarification, we must first know the causes of clarifi- 
 cation. The first cause is by the separation of the grosser 
 parts of the liquid from the finer ; the second, by the equal 
 distribution of the spirits of the liquor with the tangible 
 parts, for that ever representeth bodies clear and untroubled ; 
 the third, by the refining the spirit itself, which thereby 
 giveth to the liquor more splendour and more lustre." 
 
 The following paragraphs continue the subject : 302 
 treats of "Separation by weight; by heat; by adhesion, 
 as when a body more viscous is mingled with the liquor; 
 by percolation, &c." 303. "Of the even distribution of 
 spirits by heat, motion, time, or mixture of some other 
 body." 304. " Of heat, motion, and mixture of some other 
 body which hath virtue to attenuate." 305. "It is in 
 common practice to draw wine and beer from the lees, 
 which we call racking, whereby it will clarify much the 
 sooner; for the lees, though they keep the drink in hear! 
 and make it lasting, yet withal they cast up some spissi-
 
 ;S THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 tude, anil this instance is to be referred to separation." 
 In 306 be gives experiments to show that " it were good 
 to try what the adding to the liquor more lees than 
 bis own will work;" and also in 307, "Take new beer, 
 and put in some quantity of stale beer into it, and see 
 if it will not accelerate the clarification." In 309 he 
 advises experiments by putting hot embers, renewed daily, 
 round the bottles of new beer ; and lime quenched and 
 unquenched, and notice the effect on even distribution or 
 refining of the spirit. 310. He suggests shaking: "Take 
 bottles and swing them, or carry them in a wheelbarrow 
 over rough ground twice a-day ; but then you may not 
 fill the bottles full, but leave some air, for if the liquor 
 come to the stopple, it cannot play nor flower; and when 
 you have shaken them well either way, pour the drink into 
 another bottle, stopped also close after the usual manner, 
 for if it stay with much drink in it, the drink will pall ; 
 neither will it settle so perfectly in all the parts. Let it 
 stand some twenty-four hours ; then take it, and put it 
 again into a bottle with air, id supra ; and thence into a 
 bottle stopped, ut supra ; and so repeat the operations for 
 seven days. Note, that in the emptying of one bottle into 
 another, you must do it swiftly, lest the drink pall. This 
 instance is referred to the even distribution of the spirits 
 by motion." Elsewhere he suggests ropes in the cask. 
 In 311 he treats of clarification by percolation, or separa- 
 tion hy adhesion. Let " milk be put into new beer, and 
 stirred with it, for it may be that the grosser part of the 
 beer will cleave to the milk ; the doubt is, whether it will 
 sever again, which is soon tried. It is usual in clarifying 
 Hippocras to put in milk, which after severeth and carrieth 
 with it the grosser parts of the Hippocras, as hath been 
 said elsewhere. Eggs are tried by some. Also for the 
 better clarification b} r percolation when they thin new beer, 
 they use to let it pass through a strainer ; and it is like 
 the finer the strainer is the clearer it will be."
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 79 
 
 Nat. Hist., c. iv. 312, he goes on to maturation: "For 
 the maturation of drinks, it is wrought by the congregation 
 of the spirits together, whereby they digest more perfectly 
 the grosser parts ; and it is effected partly by the same 
 means that clari6cation is, whereof we spake before ; but 
 then note that an extreme clarification doth spread the 
 spirits so smooth as they become dull and the drink dead, 
 which ought to have a little flowering. And therefore all 
 your clear amber drink is flat." 313. "We see the de- 
 grees of maturation of drinks : in must, in wine (as it is 
 drunk), and in vinegar. Whereas must hath not the 
 spirits well congregated, wine hath them well united, so 
 as they make the parts somewhat more oily ; vinegar hath 
 them congregated, but more jejune and in smaller quantity, 
 the greatest and finest spirit part being exhaled : for we 
 see vinegar is made by setting the vessel of wine against 
 the hot sun ; and therefore vinegar will not burn, for that 
 the finer part is exhaled." 314. "The refreshing or 
 quickening of drink palled or dead is by enforcing the 
 motion of the spirit ; so we see that open weather relaxeth 
 the spirit, and maketh it more lively in motion. We see 
 also bottling of beer or ale, while it is new and full of 
 spirit, so that it spirteth when the stopple is taken forth, 
 maketh the drink more quick and windy. A pan of coals 
 in the cellar doth likewise good, and maketh the drink 
 work again. New drink, put to drink which is dead, pro- 
 voketh it to work again ; nay, which is more, as some 
 affirm, a brewing of new beer set bij old beer maketh it 
 work again. It were good also to enforce the spirits by 
 some mixtures, that may excite and quicken them ; as by 
 putting into the bottles nitre, chalk, lime, &c." 315. "It 
 is said that the burying the bottles of drink well stopped, 
 either in dry earth a good depth, or in the bottom of a 
 well within water, and, best of all, the hanging of them in 
 a deep well somewhat above the water for some fortnight's 
 space, is an excellent means of making drink fresh and
 
 80 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 quick ; for the cold doth not cause any exhaling of the 
 spirits at all, as heat doth, though it rarefieth the rest that 
 remain ; but cold maketh the spirits vigorous and irritates 
 them, whereby they incorporate the parts of liquor per- 
 fectly." 
 
 Nontm Organum, xlvii. : "Among prerogative instances 
 in the 23rd place is quantity, which, borrowing a term 
 from medicine, I call also doses of Nature. . . . All parti- 
 cular virtues act according to the greater or less quantity 
 of the body. Large quantities of water corrupt slowly, 
 small ones quickly. Wine and beer ripen and become fit 
 to drink much more quickly in bottles than in casks." 
 
 Nat. Hist., c. ix. 861 : " Time doth change fruit, as apples, 
 pears, &c, from more sour to more sweet ; but contrari- 
 wise liquors, even those that are of the juice of fruit, from 
 more sweet to more sour; as wort, must, new verjuice, 
 &c. The cause is the congregation of the spirits together ; 
 for in both kinds the spirit is attenuated by time ; but in 
 the first kind it is more diffused, and more mustered by the 
 grosser parts, which the spirits do but digest. But in 
 drinks the spirits do reign, and finding less opposition of 
 the parts, become themselves more strong, which causeth 
 also more strength in the liquor ; such as if the spirits be 
 of the hotter sort, the liquor becometh apt to burn ; but in 
 time it causeth likewise, when the higher spirits are evapo- 
 rated, more sourness." 
 
 Novum Organum, Book ii. 50 : " Polychrest instances, or 
 instances of general use. ... I remember to have heard of 
 bottles of wine being let down into a deep well to cool • but 
 through accident or neglect being left there for many years, 
 and then taken out, and that the wine was not only free 
 from sourness and flatness, but much finer tasted, owing, 
 it would seem, to a more exquisite commixture of its 
 parts." 
 
 In Life and Death, Part ii. 23 : " Age in wine or liquor 
 engenders subtlety in the parts of the liquor and acrimony
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 81 
 
 in the spirits ; whereof the first is beneficial, the second 
 hurtful. To avoid, therefore, this complication, put into the 
 cask, before the wine has settled at all, a piece of well -boiled 
 poi-k or venison, that the spirits of the wine may have 
 something to prey upon and devour, and thereby lose their 
 pungency. " 
 
 Of Heat and Cold: "The sunbeams do ripen all fruits, 
 and addeth to them a sweetness or fatness ; and yet some 
 sultry, hot days, overcast, are noted to ripen more than 
 bright days. The sunbeams are thought to mend distilled 
 waters, the glasses being well stopped, and to make them 
 more virtuous and fragrant. The sunbeams do turn wine into 
 vinegar, but query whether they would not sweeten ver- 
 juice 1 ? The sunbeams do pall any wine or beer that is set 
 in them. Bitter frosts do make all drinks to taste more 
 dead and flat. Paracelsus reporteth, if a glass of wine be 
 set upon a terrace in a bitter frost, it will leave some liquor 
 unfrozen in the centre of the glass, which excelleth spiritus 
 vini drawn by fire." 
 
 Nat. Hist., c. ix. 898 : "The turning of wine into vine- 
 gar is a kind of putrefaction ; and in making of vinegar 
 they use to set vessels of wine over against the noon sun, 
 which calleth out the more oily spirits, and leaveth the liquor 
 more sour and hard. We see also that burnt wine is more 
 hard and astringent than wine sunburnt. It is said that 
 cyder in navigations under the line ripeneth, when wine or 
 beer soureth. It were good to set a rundlet of verjuice 
 over against the sun in summer, as they do vinegar, to see 
 whether it will ripen and sweeten." 
 
 In History of Dense and Rare, 3 : "I have heard that 
 new wine just trodden out, and still fermenting, when put 
 into a strong and thick glass (the mouth of the glass being 
 so closed and sealed that the must could neither burst it 
 nor break through), as the spirit could find no vent, has 
 with continued circulation and vexation, completely trans- 
 formed itself into tartar, so that nothing remained in
 
 82 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 the glass except vapour and lees. But of this I am not 
 certain." 
 
 Nat. Hist., c. viii. 781 : "It is said they have a manner 
 to prepare the Greek wines, to keep them from fuming and 
 inebriating, by adding some sulphur or alum, whereof the 
 one is unctuous, the other is astringent. And certain it is 
 that those two natures do most repress fumes. This ex- 
 periment should be transferred unto other wine and strong 
 beer by putting in some like substances, while they work, 
 which may make them both to fume less and to inflame 
 less." 
 
 Nat. Hist., c. iv. 339 : "All moulds are inceptions of putre- 
 faction." 341. "The 1st means of preventing putrefac- 
 tion is cold ; for so we see that meat and drink will keep 
 longer unputrefied or unsoured in winter than in summer ; 
 . . . put in conservatories of snow, will keep fresh. This 
 worketh by the detention of the tangible parts." 342. " The 
 2nd is astringents." 345. " The 3rd is excluding the air, 
 and again exposing to the air, &c. . . ." 344. "The 4th 
 is motion and stirring. . . ." 345. " The 6th is the 
 strengthening of the spirits of bodies. It should be tried 
 also whether chalk put into water or drink doth not pre- 
 serve it from putrefying or speedy souring. So we see that 
 strong beer will last longer than small, and all things that 
 are hot and aromatical do help to preserve liquors." 347. 
 "The 7th is the separation of cruder parts." 348. "The 
 8th is the drawing forth continually of the part where putre- 
 faction beginneth." 349. " The 9th is a commixture of 
 something that is more oily and sweet." 350. " The 10th 
 is the commixture of something that is dry." In 378 he 
 again mentions hanging bottles of wine, beer, and milk in 
 wells in various stages, and the results. 
 
 He notices that "all bodies have their own dimensions 
 and gravities ; water has more weight but less dimension 
 than wine." In De Augm. Scient. he has numerous expe- 
 riments to prove this scattered all over the work.
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. S3 
 
 The idea of stimulants seemed to run much in his head, 
 many of his figures of speech being taken from their techno- 
 logy. " Silence is the fermentation of thought " (De Augm. 
 Scient.). In Novum Organum (xx.) he calls his first group of 
 collected instances his " first vintage." He gives the action 
 of yeast as an example of natural magic (li. ). He explains 
 poetically the Greek fable of Dionysus or Bacchus. " In 
 his early youth he was the first to invent and explain the 
 culture of the vine, and the making of wine and its use ; 
 whereby becoming illustrious, he subdued the whole world. 
 . . . His sacred tree was the ivy." " Founders and uniters 
 of states were honoured but with titles of worthies or demi- 
 gods, as Hercules ; on the other side, such as were inventors 
 and authors of new arts, endowments, and commodities 
 towards man's life, were ever consecrated amongst the gods 
 themselves, as Ceres and Bacchus." In his prose poem, 
 which contained his ideas of a perfect state — The New 
 Atlantis — he said : " There were two long galleries, one 
 in which were patterns and samples of all rare inventions, 
 and in the other were statues of all the principal inventors, 
 such as the Inventor of Wine, the Inventor of Bread, the 
 Inventor of Sugar." " We had also drink of three sorts, 
 all wholesome and good — wine of the grape; a drink of 
 grain, such as is with us our ale, but more clear; and a 
 kind of cider made of a fruit of that country, a wonderful 
 pleasing and refreshing drink." 
 
 After describing the festivities of the " Son of the Vine," 
 with his cluster of golden grapes, his cicerone tells him, 
 " We have also large and various orchards and gardens, 
 . . . where trees and berries are set, whereof we make 
 divers kinds of drinks, besides the vineyards. ... I will 
 not hold you long with recounting of our brewhouses and 
 bakehouses and kitchens, where arc made divers drinks, 
 breads, and meats, rare and of special effects. Wines we 
 have of grapes, and drinks of other juice, of fruits, of 
 grains, and of roots, and of mixtures with honey, sugar, 
 
 r
 
 84 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTIOX. 
 
 manna, find fruits dried and decocted. Also of the tears 
 or woundings of trees, and of the pulp of canes. And 
 these drinks are of several ages, some to the age or last 
 of forty years. We have these drinks also brewed with 
 several herbs and roots and spices ; yea, with several fleshes 
 and white meats, whereof some of the drinks are such as 
 they are in effect meat and drink both. And above all, 
 we strive to have drinks of extreme thin parts to insinuate 
 into the body, and yet without all biting and sharpness or 
 fretting ; insomuch as some of them put upon the back of 
 your hand will, with a little stay, pass through to the palm, 
 and ) r et taste mild to the mouth. We have also waters which 
 we ripen in that fashion as they become nourishing; so that 
 they are indeed excellent drink, and many will use no other." 
 The health-question was ever present to his mind, and 
 he is always considering the substances conducive to lon- 
 gevity, combining them with beer and wine, and daily using 
 them. As he says himself, he was always " puddering in 
 medicines," and he considered all medicines made more 
 powerful by being mixed with wine or beer. Paul's advice 
 to Timothy was not lost upon Bacon : " Take a little wine 
 for thy stomach's sake and for thy frequent infirmities." 
 His special combinations are worthy of a separate paper — 
 e.g., his "Capon-beer," "Wine for the spirits," "Wine 
 against adverse melancholy," "Restorative wines," "Ale of 
 raisins," " Methusalem water," &c. In his History of Life 
 and Death (vii. 12) he has "The preparation of drinks 
 suited to longevity may be comprised in one precept. Of 
 water-drinkers there is no need to speak, for, as has been 
 said elsewhere, such a diet may continue life for a certain 
 time, but can never prolong it to any gi'eat extent. But 
 in other spirituous liquors (as wine, beer, mead, and the 
 like), the one thing to be aimed at and observed as the sum 
 of all is to make the parts of the liquor as fine and the 
 spirit as mild as possible." And he repeats various expe- 
 riments to make it so.
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 85 
 
 "I do much marvel that no Englishman, or Dutchman, 
 or German cloth set up brewing in Constantinople, con- 
 sidering they have such quantity of barley. For as for 
 the general sort of men, frugality may be the cause of 
 drinking water, for that it is no small saving to pay nothing 
 for one's drink, but the better sort might well be at the 
 cost. And yet I wonder the less at it, because I see 
 France, Italy, or Spain have not taken into use beer or 
 ale ; which perhaps, if they did, would better both their 
 healths and their complexions. It is likely it would be 
 matter of great gain to any that should begin it in Turkey " 
 (Nat. Hist., 705). 
 
 In Nat. Hist., c. viii. 727, he tells us, "The use of wine 
 in dry or consumed bodies is hurtful ; in moist and full 
 bodies it is good ; " and gives the reasons. He also brings 
 forward a precept of Aristotle that " wine be forborne 
 in all consumptions." "If it must be taken, let it be 
 burnt." 
 
 He gives the quaintest causes for the effects of drunken- 
 ness in Nat. Hist., c. viii. 724, 725 : "Drunken men reel, 
 they tremble, they cannot stand, nor speak strongly. 
 They imagine everything turneth round; they imagine 
 also that things come upon them ; they see not well things 
 afar off; those things that they see near at hand they see 
 out of their place, and sometimes they see things double. 
 The cause of the imagination that things turn round is, for 
 that the spirit themselves turn, being compressed by the 
 vapour of the wine, for any liquid body upon compression 
 turneth, as we see in water, and it is all one to the sight 
 whether the visual spirits move, or the object moveth, or 
 the medicine moveth. And we see that long turning round 
 breedeth the same imagination. The cause of the imaffi- 
 nation that things come upon them is, for that the spirits 
 visual themselves draw back, which maketh the object 
 seem to como on ; and besides, when they see things turn 
 round and move, fear maketh them think they come upon
 
 86 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 them. The cause that they cannot see things afar off is 
 the weakness of the spirits ; for in every megrim or vertigo 
 there is an obtenebi'ation joined with a semblance of turn- 
 ing round, which wc see also in the lighter sort of swoon- 
 ings. The cause of seeing things out of their place is the 
 refraction of the spirits visual ; for the vapour is an un- 
 equal medium, and it is as the sight of things out of place 
 in water. The cause of seeing things double is the swift 
 and unquiet motion of the spirits, being oppressed, to and 
 fro ; for, as was said before, the motion of the spirits 
 visual and the motion of the object make the same 
 appearances ; and for the swift motion of the object, 
 we see, if you filip a lute-string, it showeth double or 
 treble." 
 
 726. "Men are sooner drunk with small draughts than 
 with great. And again, wine sugared inebriateth less than 
 wine pure. The cause of the former is, for that the wine 
 descendeth not so fast to the bottom of the stomach, but 
 maketh longer stay in the upper part of the stomach, and 
 sendeth vapours forth to the head, and therefore inebriateth 
 sooner. And for the same reason sops in wine, quantity 
 for quantity, inebriate more than wine of itself. The cause 
 of the latter is, for that the sugar doth inspissate the 
 spirits of the wine, and maketh them not so easy to resolve 
 into vapour. Nay, farther, it is thought to be some remedy 
 against inebriating if wine sugared be taken after wine 
 pure. And the same effect is wrought either by oil or 
 milk taken upon much drinking." 
 
 The works of Bacon on "Drinks" would fill a large 
 volume, which might be called "Wine, Beer, and Cider." 
 He never mentions spirits as a drink. He has very little 
 original matter amusing. Shakspere's wit or humour is 
 not suggested in his works. Some collected quotations, 
 however, may be deemed interesting; as, for instance : — 
 
 Apophthegm 108. One was examined upon certain 
 scandalous words spoken against the king. He confessed
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 87 
 
 them, and said : " It is true I spake them ; and if the wine 
 had not failed, I had said much more." 
 
 Apophthegm 53. A physician advised his patient that 
 had sore eyes that he should abstain from wine ; but the 
 patient said, "I think rather, sir, from wine and water, 
 for I have often marked it in bine eyes, and I have seen 
 water come forth, but wine never." 
 
 Apophthegm 134. Alonso of Arragon was wont to say 
 in commendation of age, " That age appeared best in four 
 things — old wood to burn ; old wine to drink ; old friends 
 to trust; and old authors to read. - ' Let therefore the 
 drinks in use be subtle, yet free from all acrimony and 
 acidity, as are those wines which, as the old woman says 
 in Plautus, " are toothless with age." 
 
 Apophthegm 29. The Lord Keeper, Sir Nicholas Bacon, 
 was asked his opinion by Queen Elizabeth of one of these 
 monopoly licenses 1 And he answered, " Madam, will you 
 have me speak the truth 1 LicenticE deteriores sumus." We 
 are all the worse for licenses. A good motto for Sir Wilfrid. 
 
 " It is written of Epicurus that, after his disease was 
 judged desperate, he drowned his stomach and senses with 
 a large draught and ingurgitation of wine ; hence he was 
 not sober enough to taste any bitterness in Stygian waters" 
 (Adv. of Learning, ii.). 
 
 In his Promus (1594-96), edited by Mrs. Pott, are many 
 phrases and several proverbs in English and foreign lan- 
 guages, intended as suggestions for future work. Much 
 has been made of parallelisms between the Promus and the 
 plays of Shakspere ; but anything found there is certain 
 not to be original, so nothing can be based on it. For 
 instance, Greene says, 1 " Soft fire makes sweet malt," and 
 
 1 Robert Greene's Quippc for an Upstart Courtier, 1502: also Tib. 
 Talk— 
 
 "Soft Fier maketh sweete maulte, good Madge Mumblecrust." 
 
 [Ralph Roister Doister, 1553-) 
 Also — "Softer fire makes sweeter malt." 
 
 (Nash's Pierce Pennilesse, 1592.)
 
 8S THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Shakspere, in " As You Like It," says, " Good wine needs 
 no bush." l We need not, however*, be surprised to find 
 that Bacon, either from them or from others, had heard 
 the phrases and booked them. 
 
 470. Soft fire makes sweet malt. 
 
 5rs. Luiue radiis non maturescit botrus. The cluster 
 does not ripen in the rays of the moon. 
 
 517. Good wine needs no bush. 
 
 582. Buon vin cattiva testa, 'lice il Griega. Good wine 
 makes a bad head, says the Greek. 
 
 583. Buon vin favola lunga. Good wine talks long. 
 63 r. As he brews, so must he drink. 
 
 777. Ad vinum diserti. Eloquent at wine (Erasw.). 
 
 878. An owl's egg. It was an old superstition that if 
 a child ate of an owl's egg before it had tasted wine, it 
 would be a total abstainer all its life. 
 
 910. The vinegar of sweet wine. 2 
 
 999. In vino Veritas. 
 
 1605. Vin sur lait souhait ; lait sur vin, venin. 
 
 t6o8. A la trogne on cognoist Vyvrogne. 
 
 161 2. Vin vieux, amy vieux, et or vieux, sont aimes en tons 
 lieux. 
 
 In the Adv. of Learning, Book ii. : "As Philocrates sported 
 with Demosthenes, ' You may not marvel, Athenians, that 
 Demosthenes and I do differ, for he drinketh water and I 
 drink wine.' And like as we read of the ancient parable 
 of the two gates of sleep in Virgil, if we put on sobriety 
 and attention, we shall find it a sure maxim in knowledge, 
 that the more pleasant liquor of wine is the more vaporous, 
 and the braver gate of ivory sendeth forth the falser dreams." 
 
 1 John Davies of Hereford says — 
 
 " Good wine doth need no bush, Lord, who can tell ! 
 How oft this old said saw hath praised new books." 
 
 (1603.) 
 - Also, "The sweetest wine turneth to the sharpest vinegar." 
 
 (Euphues' Anatomy of Wit, 1579.)
 
 INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 89 
 
 In the Interpretation of Nature (cxxii. ), " I may say then of 
 myself that which one said in jest (since it marks the dis- 
 tinction so truly), ' It cannot be that we should think alike, 
 when one drinks water and the other drinks wine.' Now, 
 other men, as well in ancient as in modern times, have in 
 the matter of sciences drunk a crude liquor like water, 
 whereas I pledge mankind in a liquor strained from count- 
 less grapes, from grapes ripe and fully seasoned, collected 
 in clusters, and gathered and then squeezed in the press, 
 and finally purified and clarified in the vat. And, therefore, 
 it is no wonder if they and I do not think alike." 
 
 The authors of Shakspere's and of Bacon's works drank 
 different liquors, and therefore they did not think alike. 
 The first drank nectar; the second, wine and beer. The 
 first could not have yoked the horses of Apollo to the car 
 of commonplace experiment ; the second would have fallen 
 like Icarus, with melted wings from his high flight, had he 
 essayed it.
 
 ( 90 ) 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 WHETHER WERE THE POEMS AND PLAYS CLAIMED BY 
 SHAKSPERE OR BACON? 
 
 SriAKsrERE wrote his Sonnets and gave them to his friends, 
 •which Meres proves. He wrote his poems, printed them, 
 signed and dedicated them to Southampton, which was 
 never considered less than proof he composed them. He 
 wrote his plays and sold them to his company, which 
 credited him with them by giving him place and power, 
 and publishing them with his name after his death. He 
 acted his own plays and others, so that he knew just what 
 would tell on an audience, and thence he won his fame; 
 and he must have spoken to many of his plots and his 
 alh rations. 
 
 A claim of three hundred years ago can only be proved by 
 inference. But if the premises are good, the inference can 
 be sound. If all of the works named as Shakspere's were 
 not definitely claimed by him in his lifetime, some were, 
 and that is quite sufficient for the purpose in hand. 
 
 The earliest signed work was his Venus and Adonis, 
 
 J 593- 
 
 In 1592 the Plague had been in London, and the players 
 
 were not allowed to play often, lest the concourse of people 
 
 should spread infection. 
 
 I)oubtless Shakspere found thereby more leisure to write 
 
 a poem unconnected with the stage, or at least to correct, 
 
 beautify, and expand one he had in hand.
 
 CLAIMS. 91 
 
 We have already pointed out that Sbakspere only wrote 
 two dedications, both simple, manly, and like modern forms ; 
 nevertheless, the first, the dedication to Venus and Adonis, 
 is written as to a patron : — 
 
 1593. To the Right Honourable Henry Wriothesly, 
 Earl of Southampton, &c. : — 
 
 Right Honourable, 
 
 I know not how I shall offend in dedicating my unpolished lines 
 to your Lordship, nor how the world will censure me for choosing so 
 strong a prop to support so weak a burden ; only if your Honour seem 
 but pleased, I account myself highly praised, and vow to take advan- 
 tage of all idle hours, till I have honoured you with some graver labour. 
 But if the first heir of my invention prove deformed, I shall be sorry 
 it had so noble a godfather, and never after ear so barren a land, for 
 fear it yield me still so bad a harvest. I leave it to your honourable 
 survey, and your Honour to your heart's content ; which I wish may 
 always answer your own wish, and the world's hopeful expectation. 
 
 Your Honour's in all duty, 
 
 William Shakspere. 1 
 
 Consider the meaning of the phrases " unpolished lines," 
 " take advantage of all idle hours," "first heir of my in- 
 vention," " some graver labour " — these cannot fit into the 
 Baconian story in any way. 
 
 In one year, however, the admiration of his poetic power 
 had caused Southampton to receive him and honour him as 
 a friend, by which degree of intimacy Sbakspere opened his 
 heart like a flower to the sun. Sbakspere did take advan- 
 tage of all idle hours, and soon produced a witness of his 
 
 1 The second editions I have not seen ; the third edition of 1596 
 retains the dedication. 
 
 " 18 April 1593, Richard Field entered for his copie under the handes 
 of the Archbishop of Canterbury and Master Warden Stirrup, a book 
 entituled Venus and Adonis." 
 
 That publishers had a right in the editions is evident. On 25th June 
 1594 is an entry in the Stationers' Register. "Master Harrison, 
 senior, assigned over unto him from Richard Field in open court 
 holdeu this day a Book called Venus and Adonis, the which was before 
 entered to Richard Field, iS April 1593."
 
 92 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 "graver labour." The dedication of The Rape of Lucrece 
 in the following year reads very differently, but still less 
 like Bacon. The address is to a friend — a friend superior 
 in rank, but one who could feel Burns's idea, even then 
 common to the heart of man : — 
 
 " The rank is but the guinea stamp, 
 The man's the gowd for a' that." 
 
 1594. 1 To the Bight Honourable Henry Wriothesly, 
 Earl of Southampton, ifcc. : — 
 
 The love I dedicate to your Lordship is without end ; whereof this 
 pamphlet without beginning is but a superfluous moiety. The warrant 
 I have of your honourable disposition, not the worth of my untutored 
 lines, makes it assured of acceptance. What I have done is yours ; 
 what I have to do is yours ; being part in all I have devoted yours. 
 Were my worth greater, my duty would show greater ; meantime, as 
 it is, it is bound to your Lordship, to whom I wish long life, still 
 lengthened with all happiness. — Your Lordship's in all duty, 
 
 William Shakspere. 
 
 He acknowledges his love, his duty, and the warrant given 
 him of Southampton's honourable disposition. He confesses 
 his lines to be untutored, which Bacon would not have done, 
 and devotes all past and future work to Southampton, 
 which Bacon could not have done, as he shared his dedica- 
 tions amongst many, reserving his best for queens and 
 kings. 
 
 I do not think Baconians gather the full import of these 
 simple prose lines because they are so natural. The fawning 
 
 1 In the Stationers' Registers for this year appears : — 
 
 6th Feb. 1594. To John Danter. "A Noble Roman History of 
 Titus Andronicus." 
 
 1 2th March. To Thomas Myllynton, " The Firste Parte of the Con- 
 tention," &c. 
 
 14th May. To Master Harrison, senior. "The Ravishment of 
 Lucrece." 
 
 14th May. " The Most Famous Chronicle History of Leire, King 
 of England and his three Daughters," to Edward White. 
 
 19th June. To Thomas Creede. "The Tragedy of Richard the 
 Third."
 
 CLAIMS. 93 
 
 servility and ambitious expediencies in Bacon's dedications, 
 though harmonious enough to the ideas of his time, are not 
 so to ours. They remind us of one of the Apophthegms 
 he preserved. " Of the like nature was the answer which 
 Aristippus made, when, having a petition to Dionysius and 
 no ear given to him, he fell clown at his feet, whereupon 
 Dionysius staid, and gave him the hearing and granted it ; 
 and afterwards some person, tender on behalf of philosophy, 
 reproved Aristippus that he would offer the profession of 
 philosophy such an indignity, as for a private suit to fall at 
 a tyrant's feet ; but he answered that it was not his fault, 
 but the fault of Dionysius, that had ears in his feet." 
 
 In 1599 the first edition of The Passionate Pilgrim was 
 published ; a second edition published has not been pre- 
 served. 
 
 In 161 2 the third edition was republished as Shakspere's 
 by William Jaggard. Two of Thomas Heywood's sonnets 
 were included; and in an Apology for Actors, 161 2, Hey- 
 wood said that his Epistle of Helen to Paris and Paris 
 to Helen had been printed in his Troja Britannica, 1609, 
 which might make the world think he had stolen them from 
 Shakspere, and that Shakspere, to do himself right, had 
 reprinted them ; " but as I must acknowledge my lines not 
 worth Shakspere's patronage, under whom Jaggard hath 
 published them, so the author I know to be much offended 
 with M. Jaggard, that altogether unknown to him, pre- 
 sumed to make so free with his name." And Jaggard was 
 forced to publish his next edition without Shakspere's name 
 on the title-page. 
 
 That " friendly Shakspere," as Scoloker calls him, should 
 have thus sided with Hey wood and others in regard to their 
 claims, may be taken as an inverse assumption of the pro- 
 perty of the remainder of the verses, unclaimed by others. 
 The world then knew very much of private matters, and 
 made these as public as possible, as we may sec in the 
 Nashe-IIarvey scurrilous series of pamphlets, rising out of
 
 94 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Greene's, but not a word is said against Shakspere. The 
 plays printed under his name would have been contested 
 by some rival, made a shelter for attacks by some enemy, 
 had they not] been really his. Pirated as they doubtless 
 often were, he gives a negative assent by silence. 
 
 Now, it is perfectly certain that the two poems at least 
 were signed by Shakspere, and that even though the plays 
 were pirated, they must have been claimed by him before 
 the printers would have thought of putting his name to 
 them. That any one who invented an author would have 
 certainly chosen one " excellent in the art he professed," is 
 self-evident ; and the very ascription to him is a sign of 
 his known capability to write them. Therefore, while we 
 cannot be absolutely sure that he either printed or signed 
 the following works, we may be sure he claimed them. 
 That neither in title-page or Stationers' Registers there 
 should ever have been any variation in the ascription to 
 him (if any name is mentioned), and that there never 
 should have been in contemporary literature the slightest 
 hint of the rights of other people in them, must be remem- 
 bered now to enforce this claim, though we treat it fully 
 in the next chapter. 
 
 Probably the high praise of Meres made booksellers 
 aware of the value of his name, and henceforth we see it 
 appear on title-pages, and sometimes even in Stationers' 
 Registers. 
 
 Love's Labour's Lost ...... 1598. 
 
 A pleasant conceited Comedie called, Loues labors lost. 
 As it was presented before her Highnes this last 
 Christmas. Newly corrected and augmented by W. 
 Shakespere. Imprinted at London by W. W. for 
 Cuthbert Busby. 159S. 4to. 
 
 Copies in Bodleian, &c.
 
 CLAIMS. 95 
 
 Richard the Second ...... 1 598. 
 
 The Tragedie of King Richard the Second. As it 
 hath beene publikely acted by the right Honourable 
 the Lord Chamberlaine his Seruants. By 'William 
 Shake-speare. Lond. Printed by Valentine Simmes 
 for Andrew Wise, and are to be sold at his shop in 
 Paules church yard at the signe of the Angel. 1598. 
 4to. 
 
 An edition published in 1597, but without author's 
 name. 
 
 Copies in British Museum, kc. 
 
 Richard the Third . . . . . . 1598. 
 
 The Tragedie of King Richard the Third. Containing 
 his treacherous Plots against his brother Clarence ; 
 the pitiful murther of his innocent Nephewes ; his 
 tyrannicall vsurpation, with the whole course of his 
 detested life and most deserued death. As it hath 
 beene lately Acted by the Right Honourable the Lord 
 Chamberlaine his seruants. By William Shake-speare. 
 Lond. Printed by Thomas Creede for Andrew Wise, 
 dwelling in Paules Church-yard, at the signe of the 
 Angell. 1598. 4to. 
 
 A previous edition without author's name. 
 Copies in B. Museum, &c. 
 
 Henry IV., Part I. 1599. 
 
 The History of Henrie the Fourth. Villi the battell 
 at Shrewsburie, betweene the King and Lord Henry 
 Percy, surnamed Henry Hotspur of the North. With 
 the humorous conceits of Sir John Falstalffe. Newly 
 corrected by W. Shake-speare. At London. Printed 
 by S. S. for Andrew Wise, dwelling in Paules Church- 
 yard, at the signe of the Angell. 1599. 4to.
 
 96 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Several copies known. One in British Museum. 
 There was an earlier copy of this play printed but with- 
 out authors name. 
 
 Tlxe Passionate Pil grime T 599- 
 
 By W. Shakespeare. At London. Printed for W. 
 Jaggard, and are to be sold by W. Leake, at the Grey- 
 hound in Paules Churchyard. 1599. i6mo. First 
 edition, 30 leaves, on the 18th of which is a title, 
 " Sonnets to Sundry Notes of Musicke." 
 
 A copy in Capell's Collection, and is the only one 
 known. 
 
 Henry IV, Part II. 1600. 
 
 The second part of Henrie the Fourth, continuing to 
 his death, and coronation of Henrie the Fift. With 
 the humours of Sir John Falstaffe, and swaggering 
 Pistoll. As it hath been sundrie times publikely acted 
 by the Right Honourable, the Lord Chamberlaine 
 his seruants. Written by William Shakespeare. 
 Lond. Printed by V. S. for Andrew Wise and William 
 Aspley. 1600. 4to. 
 
 Several copies exist. Three in British Museum. 
 
 Merchant of Venice 1 . . . . . . 1C00. 
 
 The excellent History of the Merchant of Venice. 
 With the extreme cruelty of Shylocke the Jew towards 
 the saide Merchant, In cutting a iust pound of his flesh. 
 And the obtayning of Portia by the choyse of three 
 
 1 On the 22nd July 1598 an entry was made in the Stationers' 
 books. " James Robertes, a booke of the Marchaunte of Venyse, or 
 otherwise called the Jewe of Venyse, provided that it be not prynted 
 by the said James Robertes or any other whatsoever without licence 
 first had of the Right Honourable the Lord Chamberlain."
 
 CLAIMS. 97 
 
 Caskets. Written by W. Shakespeare. Printed by 
 J. Roberts. 1600. 4to. 
 
 Copies in British Museum, &c. 
 
 The Most Excellent Historie of the Merchant of Venice, 
 with the extreame crueltie of Shylock the Jewe towards 
 the sayd Merchant in cutting a just pound of his flesh ; 
 and the obtayning of Portia by the choyse of three 
 chests. As it hath beene divers times acted by the 
 Lord Chamberlaine his Servants. Written by William 
 Shakespeare. At London. Printed by J. P. for Thomas 
 Hayes, and are to be sold in Paules Churchyard at the 
 signe of the Greene Dragon. 1600. 
 
 Entered by Thomas Haies on October 28, 1600. 
 
 A Midsummer Night's Dreame .... 1600 
 
 As it hath beene sundry times publikely acted by the 
 Right Honourable the Lord Chamberlaine his Servants. 
 Written by William Shakespeare. Printed by James 
 Roberts. 1600. 4to. 
 
 Copies in British Museum, ifcc. 
 
 Stationers' entries. A Booke called a Mydsomer Night 
 Dreame is entered by Fisher. Oct. 8, 1600. 
 
 Much Adoe About Nothing ..... 1600 
 
 As it hath beene sundrie times publikely acted by the 
 Right Honourable the Lord Chamberlaine his Servants. 
 Written by William Shakespeare. Lond. Printed by 
 V. S. for Andrew Wise and William Aspley. 1 600. 4to. 
 
 Copies in British Museum, &c. 
 
 Stationers' Registers. Andrcwo Wise entered for their 
 copies under William Apsley thandes of the Wardens, two 
 bookes, the one called " Much Adoe About Nothing," the
 
 98 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 other the 2nd part of the " History of King Henry the 4th 
 with the humours of Sir John Folstaff." Written by 
 Master Shakespeare, — xijd. 
 
 This is the first time the name appears in the Register. 
 Though just before this Eleazar Edgar entered for his 
 copie under the handes of the "Wardens, a booke called 
 " Amours " by J. D. with certyene other sonnets by W. S. 
 vjd. January 3, 1600. 
 
 Robert Chester, in 1601, printed L Martyr, or 
 
 Rosalin's Complaint, allegorically shadowing the Truth of 
 Love in the constant fate of the Phoenix and Turtle. " To 
 these are added some new compositions . . . done by the 
 best and chiefest of our moderne writer?, with their names 
 subscribed to their particular workes, never before extant ; 
 and now first consecrated by them all generally, to the love* 
 and merit of the true noble knight, Sir John Salisburie," 
 among whom Shakspere writes and signs his only philoso- 
 phic poem, in which he makes a notice of the obsequies of 
 the Phoenix and the Turtle-dove figure forth mystically the 
 idea of spiritual union. What makes it all the more 
 certain that this was really from the pen of Shakspere is, 
 that, unlike other poems invited from friends in that period 
 to accompany any author's work, there is no flattery in 
 it either to Chester or Salisbury. 
 
 Merry Wives of Windsor* ..... 1602. 
 
 A most pleasaunt and excellent conceited Comedie of 
 Syr John Falstaffe and the Merrie Wiues of Windsor. 
 Entermixed with sundrie variable and pleasing humors 
 of Sir Hugh the Welch Knight, Justice Shallow, and 
 
 1 Said to have owed its origin to the Queen's express desire to see 
 Falstaff on the stage in love. The play is remarkable and unique, 
 as containing the sole attempt by Shakspere in the direction of a 
 panegyric on royalty.
 
 CLAIMS. 99 
 
 his wise cousin M. Slender ; with the swaggering vaine 
 of Auncient Pistoll and Corporal Nym. By Wm. 
 Shakespeare. As it hath beene divers times acted 
 by the Right Honourable my Lord Chamberlaine's 
 servants. Both before Her Maiestie, and else-where. 
 Lond. Printed by T. C. for Arthur Johnson, and are 
 to be sold at his shop in Powles Churchyard, at the 
 signe of the Flower de Leuse and the Crowne. 1602. 
 4to. 
 
 Copies in the Bodleian, &c. 
 
 Hamlet ........ 1603. 
 
 The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Den- 
 marke. By William Shake-speare. As it hath beene 
 diverse times acted by his Highnesse servants in the 
 Cittie of London : as also in the two Vniversities of 
 Cambridge and Oxford, and else-where. At London, 
 printed for N. L. and John Trundell. 1603. 4to. 
 
 First edition, only two copies known. One copy (im- 
 perfect) in Library of the Duke of Devonshire, and one 
 copy in British Museum. 
 
 "Lowndes' Bibliographer's Manual" (H. G. Bonn's 
 edition, 1S63), Part viii. p. 2276. 
 
 The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. 
 By William Shakspere. Newly imprinted and en- 
 lai'ged to almost as much againe as it was, according 
 to the true and perfect coppie. At London. Printed 
 by J. R. for N. L., and are to be sold at his shoppe 
 under St. Dunstan's Church in Fleet Street. 1604. 
 
 James Roberts had entered at Stationers' Hall the 
 Uevenge of Hamlet in July 1602 ; this was doubtless the 
 tragedy as published in 1604. 
 
 G
 
 ioo THE BACOX-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Lear 1 ........ 1608. 
 
 M. William Shak-speare : His True Chronicle Historic 
 of the life and death of King Lear and his three 
 Daughters. With the vnfortunate life of Edgar, sonne 
 and heire to the Earle of Gloster, and his sullen and 
 assumed humur of Tom of Bedlam. As it was played 
 before the Kings Maiestie at Whitehall vpon S. 
 Stephens night in Christmas Hollidayes. By his 
 Maiesties servants playing vsually at the Gloabe on 
 the Bancke-side. Lond. Printed for Nathaniel 
 Butter, and are to be sold at his shop in Paul's 
 Churchyard, at the signe of the Pide Bull, neere St. 
 Austin's gate. 1608. 4to. 
 
 Two other editions published in same year. 
 
 Many copies exist, but with differences in the text. 
 
 Copy in British Museum. 
 
 Pericles ........ 1609. 
 
 The late and much admired Play called Pericles, Prince 
 of Tyre, with the true Relation of the whole Historie, 
 aduentures, and fortunes of the said Prince : As also, 
 the no lesse strange and worthy accidents in the Birth 
 and Life of his Daughter Mariana. As it hath been 
 diuers and sundry times acted by his Maiesties Seruants 
 at the Globe on the Banck-side. By William Shake- 
 
 1 26th Novr. 1607. Stationers' Registers. "Nathaniel Butter and 
 John Busby entred for their copie under the handes of Sir George 
 Back, Knt., and the Wardens, a book called Master William Shake- 
 speare his historie of King Lear, as yt was played before the King's 
 Majestie at Whitehall upon St. Stephen's night (26th Dec.) at Christ- 
 mas last by his Majesties servants, playinge usually at the Globe on 
 the Bank-side vjd." 
 
 2nd May 160S. "Master Payer entered for his copy under the 
 handes of Master Wilson and Master Warden Suton a book called a 
 Yorkshire Tia_r c]y written by William Shakespeare vjd."
 
 CLAIMS. 101 
 
 speare. Imprinted at Lond. for Henry Gosson, and 
 are to be sold at the signe of the Sunne in Pater- 
 noster row, &c. 1609. 4to. 
 
 Copies in the British Museum, &c. 
 Troilus and Crcssida 1 1609. 
 
 The Famous Historie of Troylus and Cresseid. Ex- 
 cellently expressing the beginning of their loues, with 
 the conceited wooing of Pandarus, Prince of Licia. 
 Written by William Shakespeare. Lond. Imprinted by 
 G. Eld for R Boniau and H. Walley, and are to be 
 sold at the spread Eagle in Paules Church yard near 
 against the great North doore. 1609. 4to. 
 
 Copies in British Museum, iv;c. 
 
 Lucrece ........ 1616 
 
 By Mr. William Shakespeare. Newly reuised. Lon- 
 don. Printed by T. S. for Koger Jackson, and are to 
 be solde at his shop neere the Conduit in Fleet-street. 
 16 16. Svo. 
 
 This edition is supposed to have appeared before his 
 death, on 23rd April 1616. 
 
 Copies in British Museum, &c. 
 
 Several earlier editions without author's name on title- 
 page. 
 
 Though I only notice those works printed during his life, 
 it is not to be considered that he did not claim, while alive, 
 those works printed after his death, or his " fellows " would 
 not have credited them to him. There is no reason to 
 
 1 February 7, 1603. Stationers' Registers. "Master Robertes 
 entered for his copy in full court holden this day to print when he hath 
 got sufficient authority for yt, the booke of Troilus aud Cressida, as 
 vt is acted by my Lord Chamberlain's men."
 
 102 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 doubt the verbal word he must have given to many of his 
 authorship of these works. Every notice we have of him 
 shows that he was not only honourable, honest, but exact in 
 his dealings ; and there is no ground on his side to believe 
 that lie would have fathered such a huge literary dis- 
 honesty. 
 
 Though some of these had not been printed before the 
 1623 folio, many of them had been alluded to before. 
 
 The plays which were for the first time printed in the 
 folio of 1623 are — 
 
 TJie Tempest, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Measure for 
 Measure, The Comedy of Errors, The Taming of the Shrew, 
 All's Well that Ends Well, Twelfth Night, The Winter's Tale, 
 Henry VI, Part I., Henry VIII., Coriolanus, Timon of 
 Athens, Julius Ccesar, Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra, Cym- 
 beline. 
 
 Of those mentioned before 1623 are — 
 
 Henry VI, Part I., alluded to by Greene and by Nash in 
 
 Pierce Pennilesse, 1592. 
 All's Well that Ends Well, held to be Love's Labours 
 
 Wonne of Meres, 1598. 
 The Two Gentlemen of Verona. Meres, 1598. 
 Comedy of Errors, Played at Gray's Inne Revels, 1594. 
 
 Meres, 1598. 
 Twelfth Night, Manningham. Played at Middle Temple, 
 
 February 1601-2. 
 Othello. Acted at Harefield, 1602. Wurmser saw it at 
 
 the Globe, 1610. 
 Measure for Measure, by Shaxberd. Acted by his Ma ie3 
 
 Plaiers, St. Stephen's Night, at Whitehall, February 
 
 1604. 
 Tlie Tempest, acted at Whitehall, 161 1. 
 The Winter's Tale, acted at Whitehall, 161 1. Mentioned 
 
 by Dr. Forman at Globe, May 15, 161 1.
 
 CLAIMS. 103 
 
 Henry VIII. , being acted as a new play when the Globe 
 
 was burnt, 1613. 
 Macbeth. Dr. Forrnan mentions and summarises it as 
 
 acted at the Globe, April 20, 1610. 
 Timon of Athens, alluded to in Marston's Scourge of Vil- 
 
 lany, 1598. 
 Taming of the Shrew, acted at Henslow's Theatre, 1593. 
 
 Entered at Stationers' Hall 1607. 
 So that there are really only 
 Cymbeline, Julius Csesar, Antony and Cleopatra, Coriola- 
 
 nus introduced to us as entirely new plays. 
 King John we find in Meres. Published anon, 159 1. By 
 
 W. Sh. 161 1. By William Shakespeare, 1622. 
 
 Knight gives a chronological order of Shakspere's plays, 
 showing the facts that determine the dates previous to 
 which they must have been written : — 
 
 Henry VI. Part II. Printed as First Part of the 
 
 Contention, 1594. 
 Henry VI. Part III. Printed as the True Tragedy 
 
 of Richard Duke of York, 1595. 
 Richard II. Noticed by Meres. Printed 1597. 
 Richard III. Noticed by Meres. Printed 1597. 
 Romeo and Juliet. Noticed by Meres. Printed 1597. 
 Love's Labour Lost. Noticed by Meres. Printed 159S. 
 Henry IV. Part I. Noticed by Meres. Printed 1598. 
 Henry IV. Part II. Printed 1600. 
 Henry V. Printed 1600. 
 
 Merchant of Venice, Noticed by Meres. Printed 1600. 
 Midsummer Night's Dream. Noticed by Meres. Printed 
 
 1600. 
 Much Ado About Nothing. Printed 1600. 
 As You Like It. Entered at Stationers' Hall, 1600. 
 Titus Andronicus. Printed 1600. 
 Merry Wives of Windsor. Printed 1602. 
 Hamlet. Printed 1603.
 
 104 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Lear. Acted at Whitehall, 1604. Printed 1608. 
 Troilus and Cressida. 1609. 
 Pericles. 1609. 
 
 " The Tragedie of Othello the Moore of Venice. As it 
 hath beene diverse times acted at the Globe, and at the 
 Black-Friars, by his Majesties' Servants. Written by 
 William Shakespeare," was entered at Stationers' Hall, 
 6th October 1621, by Thomas Walkley, and published in 
 1622. It has an unusual introduction. 
 
 "The Stationer to the Reader. 
 
 " To set forth a book without an Epistle were like to the 
 old English proverb, 'a blue coat without a badge;' and 
 the author being dead, I thought good to take that piece 
 of work upon me : to commend it I will not : for that 
 which is good, I hope every man will commend, without 
 entreaty ; and I am the bolder, because the author's name 
 is sufficient to vent this work. Thus leaving every one to 
 the liberty of judgment, I have ventured to print this 
 play, and leave it to the general censure. Yours, 
 
 Thomas Walkley." 
 
 I imagine he thought himself imitating Shakspere's prose 
 style of dedication in this. 
 
 Bacon never at any time claimed any of Shakspere's 
 works, nor did he ever claim to be a poet. But he did 
 claim to be a great prose writer, and was most careful of 
 his property. Bacon's habit was first to plan a work, then 
 by slow steps of experiment and verification to execute it ; 
 he wrote, re-wrote, altered, improved, translated. He pre- 
 served every scrap he ever wrote, he kept even copies of 
 his private letters, notes of his speeches, memoranda of his 
 smart sayings, even of things he only meant to have said, 
 and quotations from his reading, and he signed his name to 
 all his own compositions. He had no faith in the perpe- 
 tuity or universality of the English language, and had
 
 CLAIMS. 105 
 
 most of his works translated into Latin, that all might 
 read. " These modern languages will play the bankrupt 
 with books," he said. Further, as he copies his works, 
 some of them even twelve times, and " alters ever as he 
 adds, writes, or translates," "nothing is finished until all 
 is finished." Each of his copies, to himself and his execu- 
 tors, is a separate entity, however separated by language or 
 time. In his last will he said : " For my name and memory, 
 I leave it to man's charitable speeches, and to foi'eign nations, 
 and the next ages. But as to that durable part of my 
 memory which consisteth in my works and writings, I 
 desire my executors to take care that of all my writings, 
 both of English and of Latin, there may be books fair bound 
 and placed in the King's Library, and in the library of the 
 University of Cambridge, and in the library of Divinity 
 College, and in the library of Benet College, and in the 
 library of the Archbishop of Canterbury, and in the library 
 of Eton. Also, whereas I have made up two register-books, 
 the one of my orations or speeches, the other of my epistles 
 or letters, whereof there may be use ; I do devise and be- 
 queath them to the right honourable my very good Lord 
 Bishop of Lincoln." 
 
 Is it likely that a man so careful of every scrap, of every 
 duplicate, so desirous of fame, after all possible danger was 
 over of losing his mother's affections or his Queen's ad- 
 vancement, as the Baconians dream, because of his passion 
 for writing plays, would have voluntarily ignored at death 
 a mass of writings that, even in bulk, bore no mean pro- 
 portion to those he had printed, and that in quality bore 
 a nobler impress of genius and thought than any he had 
 acknowledged? For at the end of the Resuscitatio, pub- 
 lished in 1657, Dr. Rawley gives what he entitles "a per- 
 fect list of his Lordship's works, both in English and 
 Latin," which he concludes by these words : "As for other 
 pamphlets, whereof there are several put forth under his 
 Lordship's name, they are not to be owned for his." So thai
 
 io6 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 even in the most private and confidential relations, it was 
 unsuggested even by a verbal claim. 
 
 Is it possible that executors or dependents so devoted as 
 Bawley and Matthew could have examined his papers with- 
 out finding some rough draft, some memorandum, some 
 private copy, some cipher that would have revealed that 
 these poems and plays had also a right to be bound in the 
 "fair volumes'' and sent to all the learned universities? The 
 Promus was the only scrap imprinted by them, because 
 they knew it contained nothing original even in arrange- 
 ment ; and the Conference of Pleasure in its complete form, 
 which was found in the box of papers in Northumberland 
 House, but which Bacon had not though worthy of being 
 remembered as but " a toy." The speeches are, however, in 
 a separate form incorporated in his works. 
 
 The only ghost of authority for a claim that has been 
 brought forward is connected with this Northumberland 
 MS. But it is a ghost that was never alive. There Bacon's 
 Conference of Pleasure is copied by a clerk, probably for 
 some of his patrons, who were to act in it, or dress and speak 
 in it. The paper volume formerly contained other works 
 now lost. A list appears on the outer page, among which 
 are " Richard II, Richard III, Asmund and Cornelia, Isle 
 of Dogs, by Nashe and inferior plaiers." Over the page is 
 scribbled " Shakspeare," "Bacon," "Neville," "Ne vile 
 velis," &c. — probably by some fine thread of association or 
 classification. The old "Percy" may have played in these 
 other pieces too. But there is no claiming the authorship 
 of any of them for anybody. The prosy and flattering 
 speeches of the Squire, the Hermit, the Soldier, the States- 
 man, and the reply of the Squire, are just as like Bacon as 
 they are unlike anything of Shakspere's. Certainly The 
 Isle of Dogs was by Nash. 1 The Asmund and Cornelia might 
 have been his also ; but though the Baconians give it to 
 
 1 He was imprisoned for it. "As Actaeon was worried of his own 
 hounds, so is Tom Nash of his Isle ofDojs. " — Harvey. See Appendix 13.
 
 CLAIMS. 107 
 
 Bacon, no one in the British Museum knows anything about 
 it. Whether the Richard II. and III. were Shakspere's 
 rendering of these histories, we have no means to prove. 
 Other men wrote of these histories after William Baudwin 
 in his Mirror for Magistrates. 1 Yet this chance scribble of 
 a copying-clerk is one of the strongest pillars of the Baconian 
 edifice ! Another is like to it. 
 
 Bacon writes a letter to the poet Sir John Davies, 2 
 asking him to help his advancement under King James, 
 and be good to " concealed poets ;" but one has only to turn 
 to his remarks on poesy to understand what he means by 
 that. We can see that he separates the matter from the 
 form, that he sets parabolical poetry above dramatic, and 
 calls it an artifice for concealment, independent of the con- 
 ditions of verse or prose. 
 
 " The measure of words has produced a vast body of art 
 — namely, Poesy, considered with reference not to the 
 matter of it, but to the style and form of it, that is to say, 
 metre and verse. But for Poesy, whether we speak of 
 Inventions or metre, it is like a luxuriant plant that comes 
 out of the lust of the earth, without any formal seed. Where- 
 fore, it spreads everywhere and is scattered far and wide, 
 so that it would be vain to take thought about the defects 
 of it. With this, therefore, we need not trouble ourselves." 
 — De Angm. Sci. lib. vi. 
 
 (Poesy — feigned History or Fables.) De Augmentis, 
 Book ii. : " It is concerned with individuals ; ... it com- 
 monly exceeds the measure of nature, joining at pleasure 
 things which in nature would never have come together, 
 and introducing things which in nature would never have 
 come together, and introducing things which in nature 
 would never have come to pass. . . . This is the work of 
 Imagination." 
 
 Chap. xiii. : " Under the name of Poesy, I treat only of 
 feigned History. . . . Narrative poetry is a mere imita- 
 
 1 See Appendix, Note 17. - See Appendix, Note 15.
 
 108 THE BACON- SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 tion of History. . . . Dramatic poetry is Ilistory made 
 visible ; for it represents actions as if they were present, 
 whereas History represents them as past." "A sound 
 argument may be drawn from Poesy to show that there is 
 agreeable to the spirit of man a more ample greatness, a 
 more perfect order, and a more beautiful variety than it 
 can anywhere find in nature. . . . Dramatic poetry, which 
 has the Theatre for its world, would be of excellent use if 
 well directed. For the stage is capable of no small influ- 
 ence both of discipline and corruption. Now of corrup- 
 tions of this kind we have enough ; but the discipline has 
 in our times been plainly neglected. And though "; in 
 modern states play-acting is esteemed but as a toy, except 
 when it is too satirical and biting ; yet among the ancients 
 it was used as a means of educating men's minds to virtue. 
 Nay, it has been regarded by learned men and great 
 philosophers as a kind of musician's bow by which men's 
 minds may be played upon. And certainly, it is most true, 
 and one of the great secrets of nature, that the minds of 
 men are more open to impressions and affections when 
 many are gathered together than when they are alone. 
 .... True history may be written in verse, and feigned 
 history in prose. ... It is of double use, and serves 
 for contrary purposes, for it serves for an enfoldment; 
 and it likewise serves for illustration. In the latter case 
 the object is a certain method of teaching ; in the former, 
 an artifice for concealment. . . . The numbers of Pytha- 
 goras, the enigmas of the Sphinx, the fables of iEsop, the 
 apophthegms of ancient sages were parabolical poesy . . . 
 a mystery involved in many of them." . . . 
 
 The New Atlantis and the Masques would quite fit these 
 definitions. His being " wholly exercised in inventions " 
 is also evidently explained by the experiments and inventions 
 he made. " I have taken all knowledge to be my province ; 
 and if I could purge it of two sorts of rovers, whereof the 
 one with disputations, confutations, and verbosities, the
 
 CLAIMS. 109 
 
 other with blind experiments and auricular traditions and 
 impostures, hath committed so many spoils ; I hope I 
 should bring in industrious observations, grounded con- 
 clusions, and profitable inventions and discoveries : the best 
 state of that province. This, whether it be curiosity, or 
 vainglory, or nature, or, if one take it favourably, philan- 
 thropia, is so fixed in my mind that it cannot be removed." 
 — Letter to Burghley, 1592. He often uses the word in 
 this sense, as well as his previous one — a poetic conception 
 of a fictitious tale, such as would suggest our modern novel. 
 On the other hand, he distinctly states to the Earl of 
 Essex : " I profess not to be a poet ; but I prepared a 
 sonnet directly tending to draw on Her Majesty's recon- 
 cilement to my Lord, which I remember I also showed to 
 a great person, one of my Lord's nearest friends, who com- 
 mended it. This, though it be, as I said, but a toy, yet it 
 showed plainly in what spirit I proceeded." We may rest 
 assured that, if Bacon did not profess to be a poet, he was 
 not one. The "Lines to a Retired Courtier" are not 
 claimed by Bacon, but given to him by Baconians. I 
 should much rather think them by Raleigh. 
 
 The few lines in the "Masque of an Indian Prince," and 
 the few lines published in Sir Walter Raleigh's poems as by 
 Bacon, are very probably his. 
 
 " The man of life upright, whose guiltless heart is free 
 From all dishonest deeds and thoughts of vanity. 
 That man whose silent days in harmless joys are spent, 
 Whom hopes cannot delude nor fortune discontent, 
 That man needs neither tower nor armour for defence." 
 
 There are few prose writers who have not occasionally 
 tried verse. 
 
 Of the translations of certain Psalms into English verse 
 by Bacon, 1624, Spedding says: "These were the only 
 verses certainly of Bacon's making that have come to us, 
 and probably, with one or two slight exceptions, the only 
 verses he ever wrote."
 
 no THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 That a man capable in 1623 of altering and editing the 
 blank verse Plays, should have become so disorganised as 
 to be able to print, even if he had written, the commonplace 
 rhymed versifications of the Psalms in 1624, could be 
 accounted for only by some unknown disease. 
 
 We may therefore rest assured that William Shakspere 
 claimed his works during his life, though he had so be- 
 stowed the copyrights as not to have them to leave in his 
 will. 
 
 We may exonerate Bacon not only from claiming the 
 Plays in life or in death, but from suggesting in his works 
 that he might have written them. 
 
 But not only were the Poems and Plays printed as 
 Shakspere's at the outset, both in the early editions and 
 the standard editions of 1623 and 1632, but they continued 
 to be so by the old stationers and by the modern editors 
 without exception or scepticism. We must not forget the 
 old proverb, " Possession is nine points of the law." Our 
 arguments, then, do not require to be one quarter as strong 
 as those of the other side to overwhelm them. But we 
 have an opinion, shared by many, that they are stronger.
 
 ( III ) 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 
 
 The external evidence of other people's writings, however, 
 is the most convincing proof. 
 
 1592. The earliest printed notice which alludes to Shak- 
 spere is in Greene's Groat 1 s- worth of Wit, where he, in an 
 oft-quoted passage, evidently aims at Shakspere's growing 
 fame as an actor, and his enti*ance on a dramatic career 
 as the critic and adapter of other men's dramas, and 
 calls him "an absolute Johannes Factotum" and "the only 
 Shakescene in a country." Besides quoting from one of 
 Shakspere's plays, Greene suggests that he also assisted in 
 stage- management, and points to the fact that he was 
 dominant by that time, and that other witty writers were 
 subject to his pleasures. 
 
 Greene's scorn of the actors, the " puppits," the " buck- 
 ram gentlemen," seems embittered by the fact that one of 
 them should be "able to bumbast out a blanke verse as 
 well as the best of you." As a rival of Shakspere it is 
 wonderful he had so little else to say against him ; and 
 yet it came very badly from him, who only just before, in 
 Greene's Quip for an Upstati Courtier, had translated whole- 
 Bale, from verse into his prose, The Debate between Pride 
 and Lowliness, by T. F., probably Francis Thynne, printed 
 by Charlewood several years before Greene's pamphlet. 
 
 "Young Juvenal, that biting satyrist, 1 and thou no less 
 
 1 Nash.
 
 
 U2 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 deserving than the other two. . . . Base-minded men all 
 three of you, if by my miserie ye be not warned ; for unto 
 none of you (like me) sought those burres to cleave : those 
 Puppits (I meane) that speak from our mouths, those 
 anticks garnished in our colours. Is it strange that I, to 
 whom they all have been beholding ; is it not like that you, 
 to whom they all have been beholding, shall (were ye in 
 that case that I am now) be both at once of them forsaken 1 
 Yes, trust them not : for there is an upstart crow, beautified 
 with our feathers, that with his Tiger's Heart Wrapt in a 
 Player's Hide l supposes he is as well able to bumbast out a 
 blanke verse as the best of you ; and being an absolute 
 Johannes factotum, is in his own conceit the only Shake- 
 scene in a countrie. Oh, that I might intreate your rare 
 wits to be employed in more profitable courses ; and let 
 these Apes imitate your past excellence, and never more 
 acquaint them with your admired inventions. . . . "Whilst 
 you may, seeke you better maisters, for it is pittie men of 
 such rare wits 2 should be subject to the pleasures of such 
 rude groomes. In this I might insert two more that both 
 have writ against these buckram gentlemen. For other 
 new comers I leave them to the mercy of those painted 
 monsters, who, I doubt not, will drive the best-minded to 
 despise them." — Greene's Groat' s-iuorth of Wit. 
 
 This and Greene's Quippe for an Upstart Courtier really 
 led to the Nash-Harvey dispute, as Nash was by some 
 supposed to have aided Greene ; by others, Chettle, the 
 editor, was blamed. The one point, however, in which all 
 concerned agreed was the praise of Shakspere, and the 
 clearing his name from any blame. 
 
 " Greene, the coney-catcher of this dreame, the autour — 
 
 1 "Oh, Tyger's heart wrapt in a woman's hide." — 3rd Part, King 
 Henry VI. Probably Marlowe and Greene were part authors of the 
 two Parts of The Contention and The True Trarjedic, upon which Parts 
 II. and III. of King Henry VI. are based. 
 
 * Marlow, Lodge, and Nash.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 115 
 
 for his dainty device deserveth the Hauter. ... I would 
 not wish a sworn enemie to be more basely valued, or more 
 vilely reputed than the common voice of the citie esteemeth 
 him that sought fame by diffamation of other, but hath 
 utterly discredited himself, and is notoriously grown a pro- 
 verbe of infamy and contempt. . . . Honour is precious, 
 worship of value, fame invaluable. They perilously threaten 
 the Commonwealth that go about to violate the inviolable 
 partes thereof ; many will sooner lose their lives than the 
 least jott of their reputation." 1 
 
 1592. In Pierce Penmlesse, by Thomas Nash, we find: 
 " Other newes I am advertised of, that a scald triviall lying 
 pamphlet called Green's Groat' s-ivorth of Wit is given out 
 to be of my doing. God never have care of my soule, but 
 utterly renounce me, if the least word or syllable in it 
 proceeded from my pen." Farther on he alludes to Shak- 
 spere's Henri) Y. "How would it have joyed brave Talbot 
 (the terror of the French) to thinke that after he had lyen 
 two hundred yeares in his toombe, he should triumph again 
 on the stage, and have his bones new embalmed with the 
 teares of 10,000 spectators at least (at several times), who, 
 in the tragedian that represents his person, imagine they 
 see him fresh- bleeding." And again, "If you tell them 
 what a glorious thing it is to have Henry V. represented 
 on the stage, leading the French king prisoner and forcing 
 both him and the Dolphin to swear fealtie. Aye, but (will 
 they say) what doo we get by it ? respecting neither the 
 right of fame that is due to the nobility deceased, nor what 
 hopes of eternity are to be proposed to adventurous minds, 
 to encourage them forward." Nash further praises plays 
 in general. 
 
 1592. In Foure Letters and Certain Sonnets, especially 
 
 touching Ptobert Greene and other parties by him abused, 
 
 Gabriel Harvey seems to praise Shakspere : " Vile Greene, 
 
 would thou wearest halfe so honest as the worst of the 
 
 1 Very BUggestive of Cassio's regard for " reputation."
 
 ii 4 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 foure whom thou upraidest, or halfe so learned as the un- 
 learnedst of the three ! Thanke others for thy borrowed 
 and filched plumes of some little Italianated bravery, and 
 what remaineth but flat impudence and grosse detraction ; 
 the proper ornaments of thy sweet utterance." . . . 
 
 He adds : " If any distresse be miserable, diffamation is 
 intolerable, especially to mindes that would rather deserve 
 just commendation than unjust slander. That 'is done, can- 
 not de facto be undone ; but I appeale to wisedome how dis- 
 creetly, and to justice, how deservedly it is done ; and re- 
 quest the one to do us reason in shame of impudency, and 
 beseech the other to] do us right in reproach of calumny. 
 It was my intention so to demeane myself in the whole, and 
 so to temper my stile in every part, that I might neither 
 seeme blinded with affection, nor enraged with passion ; 
 nor partiall to friend, nor prejudiciall to enemie, nor in- 
 jurious to the worst, nor offensive to any, but mildly and 
 calmly show how discredite reboundeth upon the autors, as 
 dust flyeth back into the wag's eyes, that will need be puff- 
 ing it out." And in the next year, in Pierce's Superero- 
 gation he adds, " He is very simple who would fear a ray ling 
 Greene." 
 
 1592. Greene's friend Chettle, who had edited his Groats- 
 worth of Wit, publishes Kind Hart's Dream, in which he 
 says of Shakspere : " About three months since died Mr. 
 Robert Greene, leaving many papers in sundry bookseller's 
 hands, among others, his Groatsicorth of Wit, in which a 
 letter written to divers playmakers is offensively by one 
 or two of them taken. With neither of them that take 
 offence was I acquainted, and with one of them, I care not 
 if I never be ; the other, whom at that time I did not so 
 much spare as since I wish I had, for that as I have 
 moderated the heat of living writers, I mighte have used 
 my own discretion (especially in such a case), the author 
 bring dead. That I did not, I am as sorry as if the ori- 
 ginall fault had beene my fault, because myselfe have seene
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 115 
 
 his demeanour no less civille than he, exelent in the qualitie 
 he professes. Besides, divers of worship have reported 
 his uprightness of dealing, which argues his honesty, and 
 his facetious grace in writing, which aprooves his art." 
 This pi'oves him no " rude groome," but of civil demeanour, 
 excellent in the "qualitie be professes" — i.e., acting and 
 improving on pla3 r s, with a facetious grace in writing, with 
 art, and with good friends. 
 
 1593. A letter written to Lord de Clifford styles Shak- 
 spere " our English tragedian." In this year Venus and 
 Adonis was printed. 
 
 1594. Henry Willobie, in his A visa, says: — 
 
 " Yet Tarquyne plucked his glistering grape, 
 And Shakspere paints poor Lucrece' rape." 
 
 In his introductory verses on bis love-troubles, Willobie 
 " bewrayeth the secresy of his disease unto his familiar 
 friend Will Shakespeare, who not long before had tried 
 the courtesy of a like passion, and was but newly recovered 
 of the like infection." The verses alternate between the 
 complaint of the lover and the answer and advice of W. S. 
 This was entered in the Stationers' Registers on 3rd 
 Sept. 1594, as "Willobie his Avisa, or the true picture of 
 a modest maid and of a chaste and constante wyfe." 
 
 1594. " You that to shew your wits have taken toyle 
 In registering the deeds of noble men, 
 And sought for matter on a forraine soyle 
 As worthier subjects of your silver pen, 
 Whom you have raised from dark oblivion's den ; 
 You that have writ of chaste Lucretia, 
 Whose death was witness of her spotless life ; 
 Or penned the praise of sad Cornelia, 
 Whose blameless name hath made her name to rise 
 As noble Pompey's most renowned wife. 
 Hither unto your home direct youre eies 
 Whereas unthought on, much more matter lies." 
 
 (Sir William Herbert : Epkedium of Lady 
 Helen Branch. ) 
 
 li
 
 u6 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 1594. " Lucrece, of whom proud Rome hath boasted long, 
 Lately revived to live another age." 
 
 (Drayton's Matilda.) 
 
 1594. " Christ's thorn is sharp, no head his garland weares. . . . 
 Still finest wits are 'stilling Venus' rose." 
 
 (Peter's Complaint, Robert Southwell.) 
 
 Though these allusions are nameless, the context shows 
 that Shakspere is meant. 
 
 1595. Clark's Polimanteia. Thomas Watson, a Londoner 
 bred in Oxford, the writer of a book of passionate sonnets 
 written in and after 1582, is strangely connected with 
 Shakspere in a literary sense in W. Clark's Polimanteia, 
 published at Cambridge, 1595 : — 
 
 Let other countries (sweet 
 Cambridge) envie (yet admire) 
 My Virgil, thy Petrarch, divine 
 Spenser. And unlesse I erre (a thing 
 All praise- Easie in such simplicitie), deluded 
 
 Treciafsweet B ? dearl y beloved Delia - and fortunately 
 Shake- Fortunate Cleopatra ; Oxford thou maist 
 
 eloque'nt Extoll thy courte-deare verse-happie 
 
 Gaveston. Daniell, whose sweete refined Muse, in 
 
 Wanton Contracted shape, were sufficient amongst 
 
 .v 1 mi is, Men to gaine pardon of the sinne to Rosamond, 
 
 Heyre. Pittie to distressed Cleopatra, and ever-loving 
 
 Praise to his loving Delia. 
 
 It is difficult to catch the connection of the ideas asso- 
 ciated in Clark's mind. 
 
 Perhaps Watson wrote poems on Adonis, and Shak- 
 spere seemed to have inherited the inspiration. 1 
 
 1 Thomas Watson's poems, published posthumously in 1593, were 
 " The passionate centurie of love, divided into two parts ; whereof the 
 first expresseth the author's sufferance in Love, the latter his long 
 farewell to Love and all his tyranny." He also wrote Mellboeus and 
 sixty Sonnets, very much in the same style as Shakspere's. He was 
 much admired by his contemporaries, and it is strange he was so soon 
 forgotten.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 117 
 
 1595. "And there, though last, not least is Aetion, 
 
 A gentler shepherd may nowhere be found, 
 Whose Muse, full of high thought's invention, 
 Doth like himself heroically sound." x 
 
 (Spenser's Colin Clout's Come Home Again.) 
 
 1595. In George Markham's tragedy of Sir Richard 
 Grenville, he addresses Southampton thus : — 
 
 " Thou, the laurel of the Muses' hill, 
 Whose eyes doth crown the most victorious pen." 
 
 — meaning Shakspere. 
 
 1595. In I/Envoy to Cephalus and Procri$, Thomas 
 
 Edwardes names the poets by the best-known of their 
 
 works. 
 
 " Adon deafly making thro' 
 Stately troupes, rich conceited 
 Shewed he well deserved to 
 
 Love's delight on him to gaze, 
 And had not Love herself intreated 
 Other nymphes had sent him hayes.' 
 
 1596. The Prologue to Ben Jonson's Ever// Man in His 
 Humour alludes to Shakspere's Henry V. and Henry VI. 
 He said that the world had had enough of Shakspere's style, 
 and that he was going to show it how plays should be 
 written. 2 
 
 " Though need make many poets, and some such 
 As art and nature have not bettered much ; 
 
 1 This surely could not be Bacon. Aetion means eagle-flight, 
 suggesting his poetry. Shakspere was the only heroic name of the 
 period. All poets then were poetically called shepherds. 
 
 2 John Cleveland writes to the memory of Ben Jonson : — 
 
 " Who first reformed our stage with justest laws, 
 And was the first best judge in his own cause, 
 Who, when his actors trembled for applause, 
 Could with a noble confidence prefer 
 His own, by right to a whole theatre ; 
 From principles which he knew could not err."
 
 n8 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Yet ours for want hath not so loved the stage. 
 As he dare serve the ill customs of the age, 
 Or purchase your delight at such a rate 
 As, for it, he himself must justly hate : 
 To make a child now swaddled, to proceed 
 Man, and then shoot up, in one beard and weed, 
 Past threescore years ; or, with three rusty swords, 
 And help of some few foot and half-foot words, 
 Fight over York and Lancaster's long jars, 
 And in the tyring-house bring wounds to scars; 
 He rather prays you will be pleased to see, 
 One such to-day, as other plays should be, 
 Where neither chorus wafts you o'er the seas, 
 Nor creaking throne comes down the boys to please ; 
 Nor nimble squib is seen to make afeared 
 The gentlewomen ; nor roll'd bullet heard 
 To say it thunders ; nor tempestuous drum 
 Rumbles, to tell you when the storm doth come ; 
 But deeds and language, such as men do use, 
 And persons such as Comedy would choose, 
 When she would show an image of the times 
 And sport with human follies, not with crimes. 
 Except we make them such, by loving still 
 Our popular errors, where we know they're ill ; 
 I mean such errors as you'll all confess, 
 By laughing at them, they deserve no less : 
 Which, when you heartily do, there's hope left then 
 You, that have so graced monsters, may like men." 
 
 This seems to prove that Shakspere had been " graced," 
 even though abnormal in his developments of art. 
 
 1596. " "Will you reade Catullus ? Take Shakspere and 
 Marlowe's fragment," says Richard Carew, in his essay on 
 The Excellency of the English Tongue, attached to his Survey 
 of Cornwall, Remains concerning Britain, by W. Camden, 
 2nd edition. Shakspere was therefore able to write in 
 good style. 
 
 1596. TheDe Witt Papers. 
 
 1597. An interesting series of three university plays 
 commence. 
 
 I. The Pilgrimage to Pernassus shows the difficulties of
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 119 
 
 scholars. II. The Return from Pernassus, Part i., their 
 impecuniosity. III. The Return from Pernassus, Part ii., or 
 The Scourge of Simony. But the interest to us lies not in 
 the first, but in the second and third, in which are allusions 
 to Shakspere's Returne from Pernassus (Act hi. sc. 1) : — 
 
 Gull, Pardon, faire ladie, thoughe sicke-thoughted Gullio maks amaine 
 unto thee, and like a bould-faced sutore 'gins to woo thee. 1 
 
 Ingenioso. (We shall have nothinge but pure Shakspeare and shreds 
 of poetrie he hath gathered at the theaters.) 
 
 Gull. Pardon mee, moy mittressa, ast am a gentleman, the moone 
 in comparison of thy bright hue a meere slutt, Anthonie's Cleopatra a 
 black browde milkmaid, Hellen a dowdy. 
 
 hvjen. (Marke, Romeo and Juliet ! Oh monstrous theft, 2 1 thinke he 
 will runn through a whole book of Samuel Daniell's.) 
 Gull. Thrise fairer then myselfe (thus I began) 
 
 The gods faire riches, sweet above compare, 
 Staine to all nymphes, more lovely then a man, 
 Nature that made thee with herself at strife 
 Saith that the worlde hath ending with thy life. 3 
 Ingen. Sweet Mr. Shakspeare ! 
 
 Gull, Make mee verses in two or three different vayns, in Chaucer's, 
 Gower's, and Spenser's, and Mr. Shakspeare's. Marry, I thinke I shall 
 entertaine those verses which run like these : — 
 
 Even as the sunne, with purple-coloured face, 
 
 Had tane his laste leave on the weeping morne, &c. 3 
 
 O, sweet Mr. Shakspeare ! I'll have his picture in my study at the 
 
 courte. . . . 
 
 Gull. Let mee heare Mr. Shakspeare's veine. 
 Ingen. Paire Venus, queene of beutie and of love, 3 
 
 Thy red doth stayne the blushing of the morne, 
 Thy snowie necke shameth the milkwhite dove, 
 Thy presence doth this naked world adorne ; 
 Gazing on thee all other nymphes I scorne. 
 When ere thou dyest slowe shine that Satterday 
 Beutie and grace muste sleepe with thee for aye. 
 
 1 Sick-thoughted Venus makes amain unto him, 
 And like a bold-faced suitor 'gins to woo him. 
 
 - Romeo and Juliet, ii. 4. 3 Venus and Adonis.
 
 120 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Hull. Noe more ! I am one that can judge accordinge to the pro- 
 verbe, bovem ex unguibus. Ey, marry, these have some life in them ! 
 Let this duncified worlde esteeme of Spenser and Chaucer, I'le wor- 
 shipp sweet Mr. Shakspeare, and to honoure him will lay his Venus 
 and Adonis under my pillow, as we reade of one (I doe not well 
 remember his name, but I am sure he was a Kinge) slept with Homer 
 under his bed's heade. 
 
 It closes with the strange lines : — 
 
 Ingenioso. Whatever schollers — 
 
 Studiosus. Discontented be — 
 
 Philomusus. Let none but them — 
 
 All. Give us a plauditie. 
 
 Though the preference of the "Gull" for Shakspere's 
 poems was a dubious compliment, it is now a historical 
 reference of no mean value. The contemporary type of 
 character here satirised is illustrated in Decker's Gutt'x 
 Hornbook, yet it is possible that some special individual was 
 aimed at. John Weever writes an epitaph : " Here lies fat 
 Gullio," &c. 
 
 These two plays were first edited by the Rev. W. D. 
 Macray. The third play is also edited by him, but was 
 previously brought out in the " Arber" series. It will be 
 treated under its own date. 
 
 1598. The familiar passage in the Palladia Tamia of 
 Francis Meres, Master of Arts of both Universities, which 
 places Shakspere in this year above all ancient or modern 
 writers, was republished in the edition of 1634. 
 
 This history of literature (written probably in 1596) 
 shows that in about ten years Shakspere had taken the 
 first rank in literature as well as on the stage, and no one 
 so much as Francis Meres, Professor of Rhetoric in Oxford, 
 would have naturally studied the subject so carefully and 
 critically in his period. " As the Greek tongue is made 
 famous and eloquent by Homer, Hesiod, &c, and the Latine 
 tongue by Virgil, Ovid, Horace, &c, so the English tongue 
 is gorgeously in vested in rare ornaments and resplendent 
 habiliments by Sydney, Spenser, Daniell, Drayton, Warner,
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 121 
 
 Shakespeare, Marlowe, Chapman." . . . "As the soule of 
 Euphorbus was thought to live in Pythagoras, so the sweet 
 wittie soule of Ovid lives in mellifluous and hony-tongued 
 Shakespeare. Witness his Venus and Adonis, his Lucrece, 
 his sugred Sonnets among his private friends, &c. . . . As 
 Plautus and Seneca are accounted the best for Comedy and 
 Tragedy among the Latins, so Shakespeare among ye 
 Englishe is the most excellent in both kinds for the stage ; 
 for comedy, witness his Gentlemen of Verona, his Errors, 
 his Love's Labour Lost, his Loves Labour Wonne, his Mid- 
 summer Night's Dream, and his Merchante of Venice; for 
 tragedy, his Richard, II, Richard III, Henry IV., King 
 John, Titus Andronicus, and his Romeo and Juliet. As 
 Epius Stolo said that the Muses would speak with Plautus' 
 tongue, if they would speak Latine, so I say, that the 
 Muses would speak with Shakespeare's fine-filed phrase 
 if they would speak English. As Ovid said . . . and as 
 Horace saith of his works ... so say I severally of Sir 
 Philip Sydney's, Spenser's, Drayton's, Daniell's, Shake- 
 speare's, and Warner's works. ... As Pindarus, Ana- 
 creon and Callimachus among the Greeks, and Hoi'ace and 
 Catullus among the Latines, are the best lyricke poets, so in 
 this faculty the best among our poets are Spenser (who 
 excelleth in all kinds), Daniell, Drayton, Shakespeare, 
 Bretton. . . . For tragedie, our best are . . . Lord Buck- 
 hurst, Shakespeare, &c. ; for comedie, our best are . . . 
 Lyly, Lodge, Gascoigne, Greene, Shakespeare, &c. The most 
 passionate among us to bewail the perplexities of love 
 are Surrey, Wyatt, Brian, Sydney, Rawley, Dyer, Spenser, 
 Daniell, Drayton, Shakespeare, Whetstone, Gascoyne, Page, 
 Churchyard, Bretton, &c." — Meres' Wiifs Treasury, second 
 part of Wit's Commonwealth. 
 
 One interesting fact may be noted, that Meres, at the 
 time of this publication, was living near the Globe Theatre, 
 and must have heard Shakspere, and most probably knew 
 him personally.
 
 122 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 1598. Richard Barnfiehl, in his Remembrance of some 
 English Poets, praises Shakspere for his Lucrece : — 
 
 " And Shakspere, thou whose honey-flowing vaine 
 (Pleasing the world) thy praises doth obtaine ; 
 Whose Venus and whose Lucrece (sweet and chaste) 
 Thy name in Fame's immortell Booke have placed. 
 Live ever you — at least, in fame live ever — 
 Well may the body dye, but Fame dies never." 
 
 (.4 Remembrance of some English Poets.) 
 
 1 5 98. John Marston, in his Scourge of Villainy, says : — 
 
 "A hall ! a hall ! 
 Room for the Spheres, the Orbes celestial 
 Will dance Kemp's jigge. . . . 
 I set thy lips abroach, from whence doth flow 
 Nought but pure Juliet and Romeo. 1 
 Say, who acts best ? Drusus or Roscio ? 
 Now I have him, that nere of oughte did speake 
 But when of playes or plaiers he did treate, 
 Hath made a common-place book out of plaies, 
 And speaks in print ; at least whate'er he sayc.s 
 Is warranted by curtaine plaudeties. 
 If ere you heard him courting Lesbia's eyes, 
 Say (courteous sir) speaks he not movingly 
 From out some new pathetic tragedy. 
 He writes, he rails, he jests, he courts, what not 
 And all from out his huge long-scraped stock 
 Of well-penned playes." (Humours, Satyr 10.) 
 
 " Drusus " was a name applied to Shakspere for his 
 noble bearing, and " Roscius " to Burbage. 
 In Satyr 7, Marston also says, 1598 : — 
 
 " A man, a man ; a kingdom for a man. 1 
 Why, how now, currish mad Athenian ? " 
 
 1598. Gabriel Harvey's note on Speght's Chaucer, now 
 lost : — 
 
 "The younger sort take much delight in Shakspere's Venus and 
 Adonis ; but his Lucrece, and his tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, 
 have it in them to please the wiser sort." 
 
 J Suggesting Romeo and Juliet, Richard III., and Timon.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 123 
 
 1599. John Weever, Ad Gulielmum Shalcspere: — 
 
 " Honie-tongued Shakspere, when I saw thine issue, 
 I swore Apollo got them and none other, 
 Their rosie-tinted features clothed in tissue 
 Some heaven-born godesse said to be their mother. 
 Rose-cheeked Adonis with his amber tresses, 
 Faire fier-hot Venus charming him to love her — 
 Chaste Lucretia, vergine like her dresses, 
 Prowd lust-stung Tarquine seeking still to prove her, 
 Romeo, Richard ; more whose names I know not. 
 Their sugred tongues and power attractive beauty, 
 Say they are saints although that saints they shew not, 
 For thousand vowes to them subjective dutie, 
 They burne in love thy childre Shakspere bet the 
 Go, woo thy muse, more nymphish brood beget the." 
 
 ^(Epigrams in Oldest Cut and Newest Fashion.) 
 
 1.600. Samuel Nicholson compliments Shakspere by 
 cribbing largely from him without acknowledgment in 
 Acolastus Ms After-Wilte ;" which, however, only proves 
 the existence of the plays, and Nicholson's knowledge and 
 appreciation of them. 
 
 1600. Shakspere is mentioned seventy-nine times in 
 England's Parnassus, compiled by Robert Allot, himself a 
 poet. 1 He had two sonnets prefixed to Markham's Devereux, 
 1597, and is complimented in conjunction with Middleton 
 in the Epigrammes of John Weever, 1599. His quotations 
 are not literal according to any modern test ; nor are any 
 of the plays specified. The quotations selected from Shak- 
 spere are ranged under the subjects : " Angels, Affection, 
 Avarice, Beautie, Care, Danger, Death, Delay (two), 
 Feare, Gentlenesse, Gluttonie, Good name. Grief e (two), 
 Paine, Haste, Hope, Jealousie, Justice, Kings (three), 
 
 1 Robert Allot in 1599 had brought out The Wit's Theatre of the 
 Little World, dedicated to John Bodenham, printed by James Robertes 
 for Nicholas Ling, gathered out of divers learnrd authors. He does 
 not call it his own writing, but brings lives before the world that may 
 set a good example. Observe the distinction in " ^Yit." Shakspere is 
 not mentioned in it.
 
 124 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Lechery, Love (eleven), Miserie, Nature, Opportunitie, 
 Pleasure, Pollicie, Princes, Senses, Sorrow (two), Teares, 
 Thoughts (three), Time (two), Virtue, Use, Woe, Words 
 (five), Women (two) ; the Division of the Day, Naturall 
 (three), August, Description of Beautie in Persons (two), 
 Comparisons (eight)." 
 To the Reader. 
 
 " I hang no ivie out to sell my wine : 
 The nectar of good witts will sell itselfe : . . . 
 Go fearless forth, my book ! Hate cannot harm thee ; 
 Apollo bred thee, and the Muses arm thee." R. A. 
 
 Imprinted at London for N. L. C. B. and J. H. 1600. 
 
 1600. In England's Helicon, edited by Bodenham, among 
 other pieces appear the lines from Love's Labour's Lost 
 beginning, "On a day, alack the day," with the name of 
 Shakspere attached to it. 
 
 1600. J. M. Tlie neice Metamorphosis : a Feast of Fancie. 
 
 " It seems 'tis true that W(illiam) S(hakspere) said, 
 When once lie heard one courting of a mayde, 
 ' Beleeve not thou men's feigned flatteries, 
 Lovers will tell a bushelful of lies.' " 
 
 160 1. Among the poems prefixed to Robert Chester's 
 Love's Martyr is one written and signed by William Shak- 
 spere, showing that [he had been invited to honour the 
 poet's publication, as was then usual, by accompanying 
 verses from distinguished friends. 
 
 1602. The Returne from Pemassus, Part ii., or The Scourge 
 of Simony, publicly acted by the students of St. John's 
 College in Cambridge in January 1602, was printed in 1606. 1 
 In the reprint edited by E. Arber, the Introduction tells us 
 that it was : — 
 
 1 On 1 6th October 1605, John Wright entered for his copy under 
 the handes of Master Owen Gwyn and the Wardens, an interlude 
 called The Retourne from Pemassus, or The Scourge of Simony, pub- 
 liquely acted by the students in Sanct John's College in Cambridge 
 vjd. — Stationers' Records.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 125 
 
 A comedy written by a University pen in 1601, and addressing 
 itself to one of the most cultivated audiences possible at that time in 
 the country ; which thus publicly testifies on the stage, in the character 
 of Richard Burbage and William Kempe (Shakspere's fellow-actors) 
 to his confessed supremacy at that date, not only over all University 
 dramatists, but also over all the London professional playwrights, 
 Ben Jonson included. . . . We must point out important testimony 
 first, to the disreputability, and then to the profitableness, of the new 
 vocation of the professional play-actor ; not of the poet-actor, like 
 Shakspere and Jonson. It was probably owing to the fact that they 
 had written no plays that Burbage and Kempe were singled out for 
 their posts in the play. 
 
 " TJie Pilgrimage to Pernassas and the Returne from Per- 
 nassus have stood the honest stage-keepers in many a 
 crown's expense." 1 
 
 The characters of Part i. reappear in this Part ii., and 
 seem to teach that there is no opening for scholars but on 
 the stage. 
 
 In judging the various poets, Ingenioso asks Judicio - 
 what he thinks of "William Shakspere, referring to the 
 Sonnets, &c. : — 
 
 "Who loves Adonis love or Lucre's rape, 
 His sweeter verse containes Hart-robbing life ; 
 Could but a graver subject him content, 
 Without love's foolish languishment 'i " 
 
 Act iv. sc. 5, Burbage, Kempe. ;! 
 
 Kempe makes criticism on Cambridge acting : — 
 
 Burbage. A little teaching will mend these faults, and it may be 
 besides they will be able to pen a part. 
 
 Kempe. Few of the University pen plaies well, they smell too much 
 of that writer Ovid, and that writer Metamorphoses, and talke too 
 
 1 See p. 117. This was the third play by the same writer. 
 
 2 The criticism by Ingenioso and Judicio is of Francis Meres' List 
 of Poets, among whom is William Shakspere. "These being modern 
 and extant poets, that have lived together, from many of their cxtantc 
 worke.i and some kept in private." 
 
 8 The Kempe of the Jigge and the Nim Days' Wonder.
 
 126 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 much of Proserpina and Juppiter. Why, here's our fellow Shakspere 
 puts them all downe, aye, and Ben Jonson, too. O, that Ben Jonson 
 is a pestilent fellow, he brought up Horace, 1 giving the poets a pill, 
 but our fellow Shakspere hath given him a purge that made him 
 bewray his credit. 
 
 Burbage. It's a shrewd fellow indeed. . . . 
 
 Kempc. Be merry, my lads ; you have happened upon the most excel- 
 lent vocation in the world for money ; they come 'north and south to 
 bring it to our playhouse ; and for honours, who of more report than 
 Dick Burbage and Will Kempe ? 
 
 Kempe to Philomusus. Thou wilt do well in time, if thou wilt be 
 ruled by thy betters — that is, by myself and such grave aldermen of 
 the playhouse. 
 
 Burbage. I like your face and the proportion of your body for 
 Richard III. I pray, M. Philomusus, let me see you act a little of it. 
 
 Phil. Now is the winter of our discontent, 
 
 Made glorious summer by the sonne of York. 
 
 It concludes thus : — 
 
 " This last is the last part of The Retume from Pernassus, that is the 
 last time that the authour's wit wil turne upon the toe in this veine." 
 
 It seems evident, then, that Shakspere's fame by this time 
 had reached the University less likely to know of him than 
 Oxford. 
 
 The French phrases in the play bear a strong resem- 
 blance to those of Shakspere. 
 
 Allusion is made also to the " Isle of Dogs." 
 
 Deckar advises Jonson " not to hang himself if he thought 
 any one could write plays as well as himself ; not to bum- 
 bast out a new play with the old linings of jests from the 
 Temple's Revels, and not to venture on the stage when 
 your play is ended, and exchange courtesies and compli- 
 ments with the gallants to make all the house rise and cry, 
 ' That's Horace ! That's he that pens and purges hu- 
 mours.' " 1 (Deckar on Jonson.) 
 
 1 Jonson's Poetaster, Act v. sc. 3, 1602. 
 
 " It would seem that Shakespeare had espoused the cause of Deckar 
 in his quarrel with Jonson, though we search in vain for the ' purge ' 
 he gave the latter." — Old British Drama. See Appendix, Note 14.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 127 
 
 1603. A Mournful Dittie, entituled Elizabeth's Losse; — 
 
 " You poets all, brave Shakspere, Jonson, Greene, 
 Bestow your time to write for England's Queene, 
 Lament, lament, lament you English peeres, 
 Lament your losse, possest so many years, 
 Return your songs and sonnets and your layes, 
 To set forth sweet Elizabetha's praise. 
 
 Lament, lament, &c." 
 
 1603. Chettle's England's Mourning Garment: — 
 
 " Nor doth the silver-tongued Melicert, 
 Drop from his honied muse one sable teare 
 To mourne her death, who graced his desert, 
 And to his laies opened her Royall eare. 
 Shepherd, remember our Elizabeth, 
 And sing her rape, done by that Tarquin, Death." 
 
 1603. 1 Davies of Hereford's Microcosmos, "The Discovery 
 of the Little World, with the Government thereof," reprinted 
 in 1605. To W. S. and R. B. :— 
 
 " Players, I love you and your qualitie, 
 
 As you are men that pass time not abused : 
 
 And some I love for painting poesie, 
 
 Simonides And say fell Fortune cannot be excused, " 
 
 saith That hath for better uses you refused : 
 
 poetry is a 
 
 speaking Wit, courage, good shape, good parts and all good, 
 
 painting. _^ s l ori g a g all these goods are no worse used, 
 
 And though the stage doth stain pure gentle blood, 
 Yet generous ye are in minde and mood. . . . 
 
 Stage- Some followed her by acting all men's parts, 
 
 plaiers. These on a stage she raised in scorne to fall, 
 And made them mirrors by their acting arts, 
 
 W. S. &. Wherein men saw their faults though ne'er so small. 
 
 R. B. Yet some she guerdoned not to their deserts, 
 
 But other some were but ill-action all, 
 Who while they acted ill, ill stayed behinde 
 (By custom of their manners) in their minde." 
 
 (Tht ' 'iril Wcurres of Death or Fortune.) 
 
 1 See Appendix, Note 15. 
 
 2 ,; Roscius was said for his excellency in his quality to be only 
 worthy to come on the stage ; and for his honesty to be more worthy 
 than to come thereon." — Author s Note.
 
 I2S THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 1504. Scoloker, in the Introduction to Diaphantus, refers 
 to " friendly Shakspere's tragedies." 
 
 " It should come home to the vulgar's element, like friendly Shak- 
 spere's Tragedies, where the comedian rides, where the tragedian 
 stands on tip-toe. Faith, it should please all, like Prince Hamlet. 
 But in sadnesse, then it were to be feared he would run mad ; in 
 sooth, I will not be moonsick to please ; nor out of my wits though I 
 displease all." — Anthony Scoloker, Diaphantus, or the Passions of Love, 
 1604. 
 
 1604. John Cook's Epigrams. 1 In the twelfth we 
 
 find:— 
 
 " Some dare do this, some other humbly craves, 
 For helpe of spirits in their sleeping graves, 
 As he that calde to Shakspere, Johnson, Greene, 
 To write of their dead noble Queene." 
 
 Cook's evidence is unusually weighty, as he also was an 
 actor, and knew the truth behind the scenes. Cook was 
 the author of the play Green's Tu Quoque, 16 14. 
 
 1605. There may be mentioned here, on Mr. Cunning- 
 ham's authority, which I have not been able to verify : — 
 
 The Revel's Book, accompte of the year 1605. 
 
 By the King's Ma tics Platers. 
 
 1st Nov. — The Moore of Venis, a play in the Banketing 
 House at Whitehall. 
 
 Sunday following, a play of Merry Wives of Windsor. 
 
 On St. Steven's Night in the Hall, a play called Measure 
 for Measure. Shaxberd. 
 
 On Inosents Night The Plaie of Errors. Shaxberd. 
 
 Between New Years Day and Tvvelfe Day, a play of 
 Loves Labour s Loste. 
 
 On 7th January the play of Henry the Fifth. 
 
 On Shrove Sunday a play of The Merchante of Venis. 
 
 Shaxberd. 
 
 1 Cook's authorship of the volume cited is ascertained from the 
 Stationers' Register.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 129 
 
 On Shrove Tuesday a play cauled The Merchante of Venis 
 acaine. Shaxberd. 
 
 Commaunded by the King's Ma tie . 
 
 1605. Camden, in his Remaines concerning i?nYam, brackets 
 Shakspere with Sydney and other foremost wits of that 
 time. 
 
 "These may suffice for some poetical descriptions of our ancient 
 poets. If I would come to our time, what a world could I present to 
 you out of Sir Philip Sydney, Ed. Spenser, Samuel Daniell, Hugh 
 Holland, Ben Jonson, Th. Campion, Mich. Drayton, George Chapman, 
 John Marston, William Shakspere and other most pregnant wits of 
 these our times, whom succeeding ages may justly admire." 
 
 (Remaines Concerning Britaine, William Camden, ed. 1605.) 
 
 1606. Ratsey's Ghost 1 appears in this year, a pamphlet 
 in which we can see the way a spendthrift rival sees other 
 people's economy and self-denial. As this was only an ima- 
 ginary memoir of a great burglar who had been hanged 
 on 27th March 1605, we have the views of the writer pro- 
 bably superimposed upon some known opinions of Ratsey 
 himself. A company of actors in the provinces had played 
 before Ratsey for forty shillings, of which money the high- 
 wayman robbed them, and he advised the chief man to go 
 to London to a manager supposed to be Burbage. 
 
 " Get thee to London, for if one man were dead, they will have much 
 nede of such a one as thou art. There would be none, in my opinion, 
 fitter than thyselfe to play his parts : my conceipt of thee is such that 
 I durst wager all the money in my purse on thy head to play Hamlet 
 with him for a wager." 
 
 "There shalt thou learn to be frugal (for players were never so 
 thrifty as they are now about London), and to feed upon all men ; to 
 lot none feede upon thee ; to make thy hand a stranger to thy pocket, 
 thy heart slow to perform thy promise, and when thou feelest thy purse 
 well lined, buy thee some place of lordship in the country, that, growing 
 weary of playing, thy money may bring thee to dignity and reputation ; 
 then thou needest care for no man." 
 
 ' 1 In the Stationers' Registers we find first part entered aud.May 1 605 ; 
 second part, 31st May 1605.
 
 l 3 o THE BACO.X-SIIAKSPERE QUESTTOX. 
 
 The player answers : — 
 
 " Sir, I thanke you for this good counsell, I promise you I will make 
 use of it. I have heard, indeed, of some that have gone to London 
 very meanly, and have come in time to be exceeding wealthy." 
 
 Shakspere had not entirely retired at this time, but was 
 still working to support his family and widowed mother, 
 though he had already bought New Place. Ratsey's satire 
 may not altogether be meant for him ; others were also rich 
 — as Alleyn. We take the tract as at least of much con- 
 temporaneous interest. 
 
 1607. Barkstead's Mirrha, the mother of Adonis. 
 
 " But stay, my muse ! in thine own confines keep, 
 And wage not warre with so deare loved a neighbour. 
 But having sung thy day-song, rest and sleepe. 
 Preserve thy small fame, and his greater favour. 
 His song was worthy merit (Shakspere hee), 
 Sung the faire blossom, thou the withered tree, 
 Laurell is due to him, his art and wit 
 Hath purchased it, Cypress thy brow will fit." 
 
 John Barkstead, like Kempe and Cook above cited, was 
 a player. 
 
 1609. 1 Troilns and Oressida is published with a preface 
 headed i\V/ms-, praising Shakspere. 2 
 
 " A never writer to an ever reader. Newes. Eternal reader, you 
 have here a new play never staled with the stage, 3 never clapper- 
 clawed with the palmes of the vulgar, and yet passing full of the 
 palme comicall ; for it is a birth of the brain that never undertooke 
 anything comicall vainly ; and were but the vaine names of commedies 
 changed for the titles of commodities, or of playes for pleas, you should 
 
 1 On 7th February 1603, Master Robertes entred for his copy in 
 full court holden this day to print when he hath gotten sufficient 
 authority for yt. The booke of Troilns and Cressida, as yt is acted 
 by my Lord Chamberlain's men. — Stationers' Records." 
 
 - It was a time when an enigmatic vein must have been in favour, 
 for in a tract of 1607, a translation from the Dutch, the editor heads 
 a sort of preface in this same fashion. "Newes to the Reader, or to 
 whom the Buyer desires to send newes." 
 
 3 This phrase was a mistake, and afterwards withdrawn.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 131 
 
 see all those grand censors, that now stile them such vanities, flock to 
 them for the maine grace of their gravities ; especially this author's 
 commedies, that are so framed to the life that they serve for the 
 most common commentaries of all the actions of our lives ; showing 
 such a dexteritie and power of witte, that the most displeased with 
 plays are pleased with his commedies. And all such dull and heavy- 
 witted worldlings as were never capable of the witte of a commedie, 
 coming by report of them to his representations, have found that witte 
 there that they never found in themselves, and have parted better- 
 wittied than they came ; feeling an edge of wit set upon them, more 
 than ever they dreamed they had brain to grind it on. . . . Amongst 
 all there is none more wittie than this. ... It deserves such a labour 
 as well as the best commedie in Terence or Plautus, and believe this, 
 that when hee is gone, and his commedies out of sale, you will 
 scramble for them, and set up a new English Inquisition." 
 
 1609. Dedication by Thorpe 1 to Mr. W. H. of Shak- 
 gpere's Sonnets, as they are explicitly termed on the laconic 
 title, which reminds us of Venus and Adonis and Lucrece. 
 
 To the onlie begetter of 
 
 These ensuing sonnets 
 
 Mr. W. H. 2 All happinesse 
 
 And that eternitie 
 
 promised 
 
 by 
 
 Our ever-living poet 
 
 wisheth 
 
 The well-wishing 
 
 Adventurer in 
 
 setting 
 
 forth. 
 
 T. T., May 20, 1609. 
 Never before imprinted." 3 
 
 1 Thomas Thorpe was a Warwickshire man. Vide unpublished 
 MSS. of Rev. J. Hunter, British Museum. 
 
 2 Was this the same W. Hammond to whom, in an early MS. copy 
 of Middleton's Witch, that drama is inscribed? Hammond is there 
 mentioned as a patron of literature. 
 
 8 Edward Alleyn notes that he bought a copy for fivepence, which 
 price is mentioned on the copy preserved in Earl Spenser's library 
 at Althorpe. 
 
 I
 
 i 3 2 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 This could not have been addressed to William Herbert, 
 afterwards Earl of Pembroke, as it is not reverent enough. 
 Poems by a Mr. AY. II. appear in England's Helicon, 1600. 
 Whether this was William Hughes, W. Hammond, W. Her- 
 bert, or whoever it was, it refers only to the person who 
 got them or collected them for Thorpe, not to the inspirer 
 or composer. 1 
 
 1 6 10. From Haslewood's Essays upon English Poets, 
 1815. 
 
 Edmund Bolton. " The choice of English. As, for ex- 
 ample, language and style (the apparell of matter), hee who 
 would penn our affaires in English, and compose unto us an 
 entire body of them, ought to have a singular care ther of. 
 For albeit our tongue hath not received dialects, or accentuall 
 notes as the Greeke, nor any certaine or established rule 
 either of gramer or true writing, is notwithstanding very 
 copious, and few there be who have the most proper graces 
 thereof, in which the rule cannot be variable : for as much 
 as the people's judgments are uncertaine, the books also out 
 of which wee gather the most warrantable English are not 
 many to my remembrance, of which, in regard they re- 
 quire a particular and curious tract, I forbeare to speake 
 at present. But among the chiefe, or rather the chiefe 
 are in my opinion these : Sir Thomas More's Works . . . 
 Sidney's Queen Elizabeths, Francis Bacon in his Heni-y 
 VII., George Chapman's first seaven bookes of Iliades, 
 Samuel Danyell, Michael Drayton in his Heroicall Epis- 
 tles of England, Marlowe his excellent fragment of Hero 
 and Leander. 
 
 " Shakespeare, Mr. Francis Beaumont and innumerable 
 other writers for the stage and presse tenderly to be used 
 in this argument, Southwell, Parsons, and some fewe 
 others of that sort, Constable, Dorset." Hypercritical, or a 
 
 1 19th May 1609, Thomas Thorpe entred for his copie under the 
 handes of Master Wilson and Master Lownes Warden, a Booke called 
 Shakespeare's Sonnettes, vjd. — Entries in Stationers' Registers.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 
 
 j^ 
 
 Rule of Judgment for Writing or Reading our Histories. 
 Note to Address the 4th concerning historicall language 
 and style. An enumeration of the best authors for written 
 English. Rawlinson MSS., Oxford, Bodleian. 
 
 1 6 10. Dr. Simon Forman notes in his Diary that he had 
 witnessed the performance of Macbeth, Winter's Tale, &c, 
 and criticises them without alluding to the author. 
 
 1610-1611. Davies l of Hereford mentions Shakspere in 
 the most complimentary manner, as a man fit to be a com- 
 panion to a king. 
 
 " Some say (good Will), which I, in sport do sing, 
 Hadst thou not played some kingly parts in sport, 
 Thou hadst been a companion for a king — 
 And beene a king among the meaner sorte. 
 Some others rail, but rail as they think fitt, 
 Tbou hast no rayling but a raygning witt. 
 
 And honesty thou sow'st which they do reape, 
 So to increase their stock which they do keepe." 
 
 — The Scourge of Folly. 
 
 161 1. In the Hawthornden MSS. we find "William Drum- 
 mond writing — 
 
 The Table of my English Books. 161 1. 
 Venus and Adonis by Schaksp. (6th and 7th ed. 1602). 
 The Rap of Lucrece. idem (two eds. in 1607). 
 The Tragedie of Romeo and Juliet. 
 A Midsomer's Night's Dreame. 4''- 
 
 16 1 2. Preface to Webster's White Devil couples Shak- 
 spere with Dekker and Heywood, and praises their " right 
 happy and copious industry." 
 
 " Detraction is the sworn friend to ignorance ; for my 
 own part, I have ever truly cherished my good opinion of 
 other men's worthy labours ; especially of that full and 
 heightened style of Master Chapman, the laboured and 
 understanding works of Master Jonson, the no less worthy 
 composures of the both worthily excellent Master Beaumont 
 
 1 See Appendix. Note 15.
 
 134 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 and Master Fletcher ; and lastly (without wrong last to be 
 named) the right happy and copious industry of Master 
 Shakspere, Master Dekker, and Master Heywood ; wishing 
 what I write may be read by their light ; protesting that, 
 in the strength of mine own judgment, I know them so 
 worthy, that though I rest silent in my own work, yet to 
 most of theirs I dare (without flattery) fix that of Martial, 
 ' Non norunt haec monumenta mori.' " Preface to The 
 White Devil, or Vittoria Corrombona. John Webster. 
 
 We should prize this attestation particularly, as it brings 
 Shakspere before us as a diligent student and painstaking 
 writer, as we know otherwise he must have been. 
 
 1612. Thomas Heywood 's Apology for Actors speaks of 
 the injury done to him by Jaggard's carelessly inserting 
 two of his epistles in the third edition of Shakspere's Pas- 
 sionate Pilgrim. " But as I acknowledge my lines not 
 worthy his patronage under whom he hath published them, 
 so the author I know much offended with M. Jaggard, that 
 altogether unknown to him presumed to make so bold with 
 his name." 
 
 1613. 1 Globe Theatre burned down during performance 
 of Henry VIII. , and probably much of Shakspere's MS. 
 
 1 6 14. Sir William Drummond says : — 
 
 " The last we have are Sir William Alexander and 
 Shakspere, who have lately published their works," showing 
 that Shakspere had at least published some of the plays. 
 
 In 1614. Thomas Freeman to Master William Shak- 
 spere. After being very satirical upon players in general, 
 he writes his only really amiable and complimentary 
 
 1 On the Stationers' Registers we find Symon Stafford entered for his 
 copy under the Warden's handes a ballad called The Sodayne Burninge 
 of the Globe on the Bankside (in Southwark) in the Playtime, on St. 
 Peters Day (29 June) last 1613 vjd., 30th June 1613. Edward White 
 entered for his copie under Master Warden Wargson's hand a doleful 
 ballad of the generall overthrow of the famous theater on the Banksyde 
 called "The Globe," &c, bv William Parrat vjd., 30th June 1613.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 135 
 
 epigram to this great player, for after eulogies to his 
 sovereign he says : — 
 
 " Not like your player, who prophanes his lips 
 With scurril jeasts of some lewd ribald play, 
 And after all upon the scaffold skips, 
 And for his soveraigne then begins to pray 
 More manerly, whilst pure, this pen of mine 
 Presents her praiers (great King) for thee and thine." 
 
 Epigram 92, Part II. 
 
 " Shakspere, that nimble mercury, thy brain, 
 
 Lulls many hundred Argus-eyes asleepe ; 
 So fit, for so thou fashioneth thy vaine, 
 
 At the horse-foot fountain thou hast drunke full deepe. 
 Vertues or vice, the theme to thee all one is. 
 
 Who loves chaste life, there's Lucrece for a teacher ; 
 Who list read lust, there's Venus and Adonis, 
 
 True model of the most lascivious leatcher. 
 Besides in plays thy wit winds like Meander, 
 
 Whence needy new composers borrow more 
 Than Terence doth from Plautus and Menander. 
 
 But to praise thee aright I want thy store ; 
 Then let thine own works thine own worthe upraise 
 
 And help to adorne thee with deserved baies." 
 (Freeman's Epigrams, Runne and a Great Cast, 1 Dedicated to 
 Thomas Lord Windsor.) 
 
 1614. An edition of England's Helicon, or the Muses 
 Harmony, published by Richard More in this year, has 
 " The Passionate Shepherd's Song, by William Shakespeare," 
 in the table of " All the Songs and Pastoralls," with the 
 authors' names, contained in this book. 
 
 1 614. Christopher Brooke, Ghost of Richard III., cele- 
 brates the author of the antecedent drama, but does not 
 name him. 
 
 1 The carelessness of Elizabethan printers is illustrated in the title 
 of this little book. On the title-page it is spelt, " Rubbe and a 
 great caste," on the sub-title page, "Rub and a great cast," and on 
 the titles of Part ii. "Runne and a great caste." As Shakspere's 
 Epigram is in Part ii., I have retained this, evidently the correct 
 spelling.
 
 136 THE BACOX -SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 " To him that imped my Fame with Clio's quill, 
 Whose magick raised her from Oblivion's den, 
 That writ my storie on the Muses' Hill, 
 
 And with my actions dignified his pen ; 
 He that from Helicon sends many a rill, 
 Whose nectared veines are drunke by thirstie men ; 
 Crowned be his stile with fame, his head with bays ; 
 And none detract, but gratulate his praise." 
 
 (The Ghost of Richard III. expressing himself.) 
 
 1 615. John Stow's Chronicles, augmented by Edmund 
 Howes, mention Shakspere: "Our modern and present 
 excellent poets, which worthily flourish in their owne 
 workes, and all of them in my own knowledge, lived 
 together in this Queene's raigne ; according to their 
 priorities as neere as I could, I have orderly set downe" 
 . . . the 13th is "M. Willie Shakspeare, gentleman." 
 
 161 5. From certain extracts in it, we judge that not later 
 than this year, and probably earlier, is the manuscript note- 
 book of Edward Pudsey ; edited and printed this year, 1 by 
 Mr. Richard Savage, Librarian of Shakspere's birthplace, 
 Stratford-on-Avon. These are selections from the plays 
 of Shakspere, Jonson, and others ; and give slightly varied 
 renderings and contractions ; but with act and scene entered. 
 For instance, AP chant of Ye. Shalcspear — 
 
 " The'll not shew their teeth in way of smile 
 tho' nesto r swear y jest bee laughable." (Act. i. sc. I.) 
 
 Titus Andronicus, Romeo fy Juliet, King Richard 2nd, King 
 Richard 3rd, Much Adoe ah : no : Hamlet. Several quotations 
 from each occur. 
 
 1 6 16. Inscription on Shakspere's Tomb : — 
 
 " Judicio Pylium, Genio Socratem, Arte Marouem, 
 Terra Tegit, Populus Maeret, Olympus Habet." 
 
 1 Shakespearean Extracts from Edward Pudsey's Book. Simpkin & 
 Marshall, 18S8. The original is now in possession of Mr. Halliwell- 
 Phillips.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 137 
 
 "Stay, passenger, why goest thou by so fast ; 
 Read, if thou canst, whom envious death hath placed 
 Within this monument — Shakspere, with whome 
 Quick Nature dide ; whose name doth deck ys tombe 
 Far more than cost ; see all yt he hath writt 
 Leaves living art, but page to serve his witt." 
 
 Obiit. Ano. Doi. 1616, iEtatis 53, Die 23 Ap. 
 
 " Good frend, for Jesu's sake forbeare 
 To digg the dust encloased heare ; 
 Blest be ye man yt spares these stones 
 And curst be he yt moves my bones." 
 
 1 6 18. Elegies on the death of Richard Burbage. 
 
 161 S. Ben Jonson to Drummond : " Shakspere wanted 
 art and sometimes sense ; for, in one of his plays, he 
 brought in a number of men saying they had been ship- 
 wrecked in Bohemia, where is no sea by near a hundred 
 miles." 
 
 1 620-1 636. On the Time-Poets. 
 
 " One night the great Apollo, pleased with Ben, 
 Made the odd number of the Muses ten, 
 The fluent Fletcher, Beaumont rich in sense, 
 In compliment and courtship's quintessence, 
 Ingenious Shakespeare : Massinger that knows 
 The strength of plot to write in verse or prose." 
 {Choice Drollery, Songs and Sonnets. Anonymous. Printed 1656. 
 Dr. Ingleby's Centurie of Pray se.) 
 
 162 1. Robert Burton, 1 in his Anatomy of Melancholy, 
 
 published at Oxford, says, " When Venus ranne to meet her 
 rose-cheeked Adonis, as an elegant Poet [Shakspere] 2 of 
 ours sets her out" (Part III. sec. ii., numb. 2, subs. 2). 
 
 1 The first edition, 162 1, has at the end " A conclusion to thereader, - ' 
 which is signed Robert Burton, and dated " From my studie in Christ 
 Church Oxon., Decemb. 5, 1620." Omitted in subsequent editions, 
 and not Bigni <1 again until the 1652 edition. 
 
 - Author's side-note.
 
 138 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 llobert Burton is careful in giving his author, saying, " I 
 have wronged no man ; I have given every man his own." 
 
 1622. The Tragedy of Othello, the Moore of Venice, as 
 it hath beene diverse times acted at the Globe and at the 
 Black-Friars by His Majesties' Servants. Written by 
 William Shakspere, London. Printed by N. 0. for 
 Thomas Walkley, and are to be sold at his shop at the 
 Eagle and Child in Brittans Burse, 1622. 
 
 Transcript of Stationers' Registers. 
 8° Novembris, 1623. 
 
 Master Blounte and Isaak Jaggard entered for their 
 copie under the hands of Master Doctor Worrall and 
 Master Cole, warden, Master William Shakspeer's Comedyes, 
 Histories, and Tragedyes, soe manie of the said copies as are 
 not formerly entered to other men, vizt. 
 
 Comedyes. — Tlie Tempest, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, 
 Measure for Measure, The Comedy of Errors, As You Like 
 It, All's Well that Ends Well, Twelfe Night, The Winters 
 Tale. 
 
 Histories. — The Thirde Parte of Henry ye Sixt, Henry 
 the Eight, Coriolanus, Timon of Athens. 
 
 Tragedies. — Julius Coesar, Mackbeth, Anthonie and Cleo- 
 patra, Cymheline. vijs. 
 
 1623. We now come to the credentials presented in the 
 introduction to the first folio. 
 
 To the Reader. 
 
 This figure that thou here seest put, 
 It was for gentle Shakspere cut, 
 
 Wherein the graver had a strife 
 With Nature to outdo the life.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 139 
 
 Ab, could he but have drawne his wit 
 
 As well in brasse as he hath hit 
 His face ; the print would then surpass 
 
 All that was ever writ in brasse ; 
 But since he cannot, reader, looke 
 Not on his picture but his book. 
 
 B.J. 
 (Prefixed to Droeshouts's portrait of Shakspere.) 
 
 Dedication, To the most noble and Incomparable paire of 
 Brethren, ' William Earl of Pembroke, &c, and Philip 
 Earl of Montgomery, &c. " Right Honourable — Whilst 
 we studie to be thankful in one particular for the many 
 favours we have received from your lordships, we are falne 
 upon the ill fortune, to mingle two the most diverse things 
 that can be, feare and rashnesse ; rashnesse in the enter- 
 prize and feare of the successe. For, when we valew the 
 places your Highnesses sustaine, we cannot but know their 
 dignity greater than to descend to the reading of these 
 trifles ; and, while we name them trifles, we have deprived 
 ourselves of the defence of our Dedication. But, since your 
 lordships have been pleased to consider these trifles some- 
 thing heretofore, and have prosecuted both them and their 
 author living with so much favour, we hope that (they out- 
 living him and he not having the same fate, common with 
 some, to be executor to his owne writings) you will use the 
 like indulgence towards them, you have done unto their 
 parent. There is a great difference whether any booke 
 choose his patrones or find them. This hath done both. 
 For so much were your Lordship's likings of the severall 
 parts when they were acted, as before they were published, 
 the volume asked to be yours. . . . We have collected them 
 and done an office to the dead to procure his orphanes 
 guardians ; without ambition either of self-profit or fame, 
 only to keep the memory of so worthy a friend and fellowe 
 alive, as was our Shakspere, by humble offer of his plnyes, 
 to your most noble patronage. . . . We most humbly 
 consecrate to your Highnesses these rcmaines of your
 
 140 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 servant Shakspere ; that what delight is in them may be 
 ever your lordships', the reputation his, and the faults ours, 
 if any be committed by a payre so careful to show their 
 gratitude both to the living and the dead as is your lord- 
 ships most bounden. John Heminge. 
 
 Henry Condell. 
 
 To the Great Variety of Reader. 
 
 From the most able to him that can but spell. There 
 you are numbered. We had rather j'ou were weighed. 
 Especially when the fate of all bookes depends upon your 
 capacities, and not of your heads alone but of your purses. 
 Well ! it is now publique, and you will stand for your privi- 
 leges wee know, to read and censure. Do so, but buy it 
 first. That doth best commend a book the stationer sayes. 
 Then, how odde soever your braines be, or your wisedomes, 
 make your license the same, and spare not. . . . Whatever 
 you do, buy. Censure will not drive a trade or make the 
 Jacke go. And though you be a magistrate of wit, and sit 
 on the stage at Black Friars, or the Cock Pit, to arraigne 
 plays daily, know these playes have had their trial already, 
 and stood out all appeales and do now come forth quitted 
 rather by a decree of Court than any purchased letters of 
 recommendation. 
 
 It had been a thing, we confesse, worthy to have been 
 wished that the author himself had lived to have set forth 
 and overseen his owne writings, but since it hath been 
 ordained otherwise, and he by death departed from that 
 right, we pray you do not envie his friends the office of 
 their care and paine, to have collected and published them, 
 and so to have published them, as where (before) you were 
 abused with diverse stolen and surreptitious copies, maimed 
 and deformed by the frauds and stealths of injurious im- 
 postors, that exposed them ; even those are now offered 
 to your view cured, and perfect of their limbes ; and all the
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 141 
 
 rest as he conceived them. Who, as he was a happy imi- 
 tator of nature, he was a most gentle expresser of it. His 
 mind and hand went together, and what he thought he 
 uttered with that easiness that we have scarce received from 
 him a blot in his papers. But it is not our province, who 
 onely gather his works and give them you, to praise him. 
 
 It is yours that reade him. And there we hope, to your 
 divers capacities, you will lind enough, both to draw and 
 hold you ; for his wit can no more lie hid than it could be 
 lost. Read him therefore again and again ; and then, if 
 you do not like him, you are in some manifest danger, not 
 to understand him. John Heminge. 
 
 Henry Coxdell. ' 
 
 To the memorie of M 1 '- W. Shakspere. 
 
 Wee wondred (Shakspere) that thou wentst so soone, 
 
 From the world's stage to the grave's tyring-roome. 
 
 Wee thought thee dead, but this thy printed worth 
 
 Tels thy spectators that thou went'st but forth, 
 
 To enter with applause. An actor's art 
 
 Can dye and live, to acte a second part 
 
 That's but an exit of mortalitie, 
 
 This, a re-entrance to a Plaudite. J. M. 
 
 1623. The verses before the book by W. Basse, "On Mr. 
 William Shakspere : — 
 
 " Renowned Spenser, lie a thought more nigh 
 To learned Beaumont, and rare Beaumont ly 
 A little nearer Chaucer to make roome 
 For Shakspere, in your threefold, fourfold tomb. 
 To lodge all four in one bed make a shift 
 Until Domesday, for hardly will a fifte 
 Betwixt this day and that by fate be slaine 
 For whom the curtains shall be drawn again. 
 
 1 Prefixed to the plays comes the li.-st of the chief actors who acted 
 in them, in which Shakspere's name stands first. See Appendix, 
 Note 16.
 
 142 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 But if Precedency in death doe barre, 
 
 A fourth place in your sacred sepulcher 
 
 In this uncarved marble of thy own, 
 
 Sleep, brave Tragedian, Shakspere sleep alone. 
 
 Thy unmolested rest, unshared cave 
 
 Possesse as Lord, not tenant to thy grave, 
 
 That unto others it may counted be 
 
 Honour hereafter to be laid by thee." 
 
 1623. Hugh Holland upon the lines and life of the 
 famous scenic poet Master William Shakspere. 
 
 " Those hands, which you so clapt, go now and wring 
 You Britaine's brave ; for done are Shakspere's days. 
 His days are done that made the dainty playes, 
 Which made the globe of Heaven and Earth to ring. 
 Dried is that vein, dried is the Thespian Spring, 
 Turned all to teares, and Phoebus clouds his rays. 
 That corps, that coffin now bestick with bays, 
 Which crowned him Poet first, then Poet's King. 
 If Tragedies might any Prologue have 
 All those he made, would scare make one to this, 
 Where fame, now that he gone is to the grave, 
 (Death's public tyring-house) the Nuncius is. 
 For though his line of life went soone about 
 The life yet of his lines shall never out." 
 
 1623. The magnificent eulogy of Jonson is almost a 
 household word, so to speak, in our literature. 
 
 " Ben Jonson, To the memory of my beloved ; the Author, 
 Mr. William Shakspere : — 
 
 " To draw no envy (Shakspere) on thy name, 
 Am I thus ample to thy Booke and Fame ; 
 While I confess thy writings to be such 
 As neither man nor muse can praise too much. 
 'Tis true, and all men's suffrage. . . . 
 I therefore will begin. Soule of the Age ! 
 The Applause ! delight ! the wonder of our stage ; 
 My Shakspere, rise ! I will not lodge thee by 
 Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lye 
 A little further to make thee a roome ; 
 Thou art a monument, without a tombe,
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 143 
 
 And art alive still, while thy Booke doth live, 
 
 And we have wits to read, and praise to give. 
 
 And though thou hadst small Latin and less Greeke 
 
 From thence to honour thee, I would not seeke 
 
 For names ; but call for thundering yEschylus, 
 
 Euripides, and Sophocles to us ; 
 
 Paccuvius, Accius, him of Cordova dead 
 
 To life again, to hear thy buskin tread, 
 
 And shake a stage ; or, when thy socks were on, 
 
 Leave thee alone for the comparison 
 
 Of all that insolent Greece, or haughty Rome 
 
 Sent forth, or since did from their ashes come. 
 
 Triumph, my Britaine, thou hast one to shewe 
 
 To whom all scenes of Europe homage owe. 
 
 He was not for an age, but for all time. 
 
 Nature herselfe was proud of his designes, 
 
 And j'>yed to wear the dressing of his lines 
 
 Which were so richly spun, and woven to fit 
 
 As, since, she will vouchsafe no other wit. 
 
 Yet must I not give nature all ; thy art, 
 
 My gentle Shakspere, must enjoy a part ; 
 
 For, though the poet's matter nature be, 
 
 His art doth give the fashion, and that he 
 
 Who casts to write a living line must sweat, 
 
 (Such as thine are) and strike the seconde heat 
 
 Upon the muse's anvil, turn the same 
 
 (And himself with it) that he thinks to frame, 
 
 Or for the laurel he may gain a scorne, 
 
 For a good poet's made, as well as born ; 
 
 And such wert thou. 
 
 Look how the Father's face 
 Lives in his issue, even so the race 
 Of Shakspere's mind and manners brightly shines 
 In his well-turned and true-filed lines. 
 Sweet Swan of Avon ! what a sight it were 
 To see thee in our waters yet appeare, 
 And make those flights upon the banks of Thames 
 That so did take Eliza and our James ! 
 But stay, I see thee in the hemisphere 
 Advanced, and made a constellation there ! 
 Shine forth thou star of poets, and with rage 
 Or influence chide or cheere the drooping stage,
 
 i 4 4 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Which, since thy flight fro hence hath mourned like night, 
 And despairs day, but for thy volumes light." x 
 
 (Ben Jonson.) 
 
 Drummond said of Jonson, " He is a great lover and 
 praiser of himself, a contemner and scorner of others." 2 
 For that very reason his praise is stronger than that of 
 others. 
 
 1623. Leonard Digges writes a poem to the memory of 
 the deceased author, Maister "William Shakspere : — 
 
 Shakspere, at length thy pious fellows give 
 
 The world thy works ; thy workes by which outlive 
 
 Thy tomb, thy name must, when that stone is rent 
 
 And time dissolves thy Stratford monument, 
 
 Here we alive shall view thee still. This booke, 
 
 When brasse and marble fade, shall make thee looke, 
 
 Fresh to all ages ; when posteritie 
 
 Shall loathe what's new, think all is prodegie 
 
 That is not Shakspere's ; every line, each verse 
 
 Here shall revive, redeeme thee from thy herse. 
 
 Nor fire, nor cankering age, as Naso said 
 
 Of his, thy wit-fraught book shall once invade 
 
 Nor shall I e'er believe, or think thee dead 
 
 (Though mist) untill our bankrout stage be sped 
 
 (Impossible) with some new strain to out-do 
 
 Passions of Juliet and her Romeo ; 
 
 Or till I heare a scene more nobly take 
 
 Than when thy half-sword parleying Romans spake. 
 
 Till these, till any of thy volumes rest, 
 
 Shall with more fire, more feeling be exprest, 
 
 Be sure, our Shakspere, thou canst never dye, 
 
 But crowned with laurel live eternally. (L. Digges.) 
 
 1 Dryden concurred with Rowe in thinking these verses sparing and 
 invidious, while Boswell thought them sincere because so appropriate. 
 Supported by the passage in Timber, I think there is no doubt he felt 
 and meant all he said. 
 
 2 John Davies, of Hereford, says to Ben Jonson, in his Scourge of 
 Folly, 161 1 : — 
 
 " Thou art sounde in body ; but some say, thy soulc 
 Envy doth ulcer ; yet corrupted hearts 
 Such censurers must have."
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 145 
 
 This portion of the Anti-Baconian evidence is a singularly 
 valuable and representative series of affidavits, so to speak, 
 from men who knew Shakspere in many relations. Con- 
 dell was probably, like Burbage, a native of Stratford or 
 the immediate vicinity, where a family of this not very 
 common name remains. 
 
 1623. The office-book of Sir Henry Herbert, Master of 
 the Revels to James I., Charles I., and Charles II., Vario- 
 rum, vol. iii. 1623-36. To the Duchess of Richmond, in 
 the King's absence, was given the Winter s Tale, by the 
 King's company, the 18th January 1623. At Whitehall. 
 
 Upon New Year's night, the Prince only being there, 
 the first part of Sir John Faldaff, by the King's company. 
 At Whitehall, 1624. 
 
 For the King's players. An olde play, called Winter's 
 Tale, formerly allowed of Sir George Bucke, and likewise 
 by mee, on Mr. Hemmings his worde that there was nothing 
 profane added or reformed, though the allowed booke was 
 missinge ; and therefore I returned it without a fee this 19th 
 August 1623. 
 
 Received from Mi*. Hemmings in their company's name, 
 to forbid the playing of'Shakspere's plays to the Red Bull 
 Company, this nth of April 1627, ^5, os. od. 
 
 On Saturday, the 17th of November (mistake for 16th), 
 being the Queen's Birthday, Ricliarde the Tliirde was acted 
 by the K. players at St. James, when the King and Queene 
 were present, it being the first play the Queene sawe since 
 her M ty ' s delivery of the Duke of York, 1633. 
 
 On Tuesday night, at Saint James, the 26th of November, 
 1633, was acted before the King and Queene, the Taminge 
 of the Shreiu. Likt. 
 
 On Wednesday night, the 1st of January 1633, Cymbe- 
 lyne was acted at Court by the King's players. Well likt 
 of the King. 
 
 The Winters Tale was acted on Thursday night at Court, 
 the 1 6th January 1633, by the K. players and likt.
 
 146 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Julius Caesar at St. James, the 31st January 1636. 
 This, of course, only proves that Shakspere wrote plays. 
 Those mentioned we know, from other sources, to be 
 his. 
 
 1625. Richard James to Sir Henry Bourchier : — 
 " A young gentle Lady of 'your acquaintance, having 
 read ye works of Shakspere, made me this question. How 
 Sir John Falstaffe or Fastolf, as he is written in ye Statute 
 Book of Maudlin College in Oxford, where every day that 
 society were bound to make memorie of his soule, could be 
 dead in ye time of Harrie ye fifte, and again live in ye 
 time of Harrie ye Sixt, to be banished for cowardice. 
 Whereunto I make answer that it was one of those hum- 
 ours and mistakes for which Plato banished all poets out 
 of his commonwealth. ... In Shakspere's first show of 
 Harry the Fift, the person with which he undertook to 
 playe a buffoon was not Falstaff, but Sir John Oldcastle." 
 — D. Ingleby's Centurie of Prayse. 
 
 1623. William Davenant :* — 
 
 ODE 
 
 IN REMEMBRANCE OF MR. WILLIAM SHAKSPERE. 
 I. 
 
 Beware (delighted poets) when you sing 
 To welcome nature in the early spring : 
 
 Your numerous feet not tread 
 The banks of Avon ; for each flower 
 (As it ne'er knew a sun or shower) 
 
 Hangs there the pensive head. 
 
 II. 
 
 Each tree whose thick and spreading growth hath made 
 Rather a night beneath the boughs than shade 
 (Unwilling now to grow) 
 
 1 Born 1605-6. One of his early poems. Appeared among his 
 poems published in 1638.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. H7 
 
 Looks like the plume a captain wears, 
 Whose rifled falls are steept i' th' tears, 
 Which from his last rage flow. 
 
 III. 
 
 The piteous river wept itself away 
 Long since (alas) to such a swift decay, 
 
 That reach the map and look 
 If 30U a river there can spy, 
 And for a river your mock'd eye 
 
 Will find a shallow brook. 
 
 1625. Ben Jonson's Timher, or Discoveries. 
 
 Jonson, speaking of poets in general, says — "Poetry in 
 this latter age hath proved but a mean mistress to such as 
 have wholly addicted themselves to her, or given their names 
 up to her family. They who have but saluted her on the 
 by, and now and then tendered their visits, she hath done 
 much for, and advanced in the way of their own professions 
 (both the law and the gospel), beyond all they could have 
 hoped or done for themselves without her favour." Immedi- 
 ately after this, as if he had taken Shakspere as the illus- 
 trative poet, he says — 
 
 De ShaJispeare Nod rat. — August us in Hat. 
 
 " I remember the players have often mentioned it as an 
 honour to Shakspere, that in his writing (whatsoever he 
 penned), he never blotted out a line. My answer hath 
 been, would he had blotted a thousand — which they thought 
 a malevolent speech. I had not told posterity this, but 
 for their ignorance, who chose that circumstance to com- 
 mend their friend by, wherein he most faulted; I to justify 
 mine own candour : for I loved the man, and do honour his 
 memory, on this side idolatry, as much as any. He was 
 (indeed) honest, and of an open and free nature; had an 
 excellent phantasy, brave notions, and gentle expressions; 
 wherein he flowed with that facility, that sometimes it was 
 necessary he should be stopped. ' Suff!amina}/<I//.< 1 rat,' as 
 Augustus said of Ilaterius. His wit was in his own power,
 
 148 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 would the rule of it had been so too. Many times he fell 
 into those things, could not escape laughter ; as when he 
 said in the person of Caesar, one speaking to him, ' Csesar, 
 thou dost me wrong,' he replied, ' Caesar did never wrong 
 but with just cause,' and such like, which were ridiculous. 
 But he redeemed his vices with his virtues. There was 
 ever more in him to be praised than pardoned." This 
 conclusively proves that Jonson loved "the man," and not 
 the works only, and that the man had extraordinary con- 
 versational powers. It is but a step to the writing of 
 thoughts, which here is also proved ; so that, even had 
 Bacon written the plays, Shakspere is shown capable of 
 having done so himself. 
 
 LVI. Jonson's Epigram. Poet-Ape. 
 
 Poor Poet Ape, that would be thought our chief, 
 
 Whose works are e'en the frippery of wit 
 From bondage is become so bold a thief, 
 
 As we the robbed, leave rage, and pity it. 
 At first he made low-shifts, would pick and glean, 
 
 Buy the reversion of old plays ; now grown 
 To a little wealth, and credit in the scene, 
 
 He takes up all, makes each man's wit his own. 
 And, told of this, he slights it. Tut, such crimes 
 
 The sluggish gaping auditor devours ; 
 He marks not whose 'twas first : and after times 
 
 May judge it to be his, as well as ours. 
 Fool ! as if half eyes will not know a fleece 
 Prom locks of wool, or shreds from the whole piece ? 
 
 Ben Jonson is supposed to have expressed in this his feelings of 
 jealousy towards Shakspere's successes in his early days, before he 
 knew and " loved the man." 
 
 1625. William Camden completely finished his Britannia 
 in 1 61 7, commenced in 1597, and w r as printed in 1625. He 
 says of Stratford — " In the Chancel lies William Shake- 
 speare, a native of this place, who has given ample proof of 
 his genius and great abilities in the forty-eight plays he 
 has left behind him."
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 149 
 
 1627. Drayton's Epistle to Henry Reynolds. This is one 
 Warwickshire man writing to another, both personal ac- 
 quaintances of Shakspere : — 
 
 " Shakspere, thou had'st as smooth a comicke vaine, 
 Fitting the socks, and in thy natural braine, 
 As strong conception and as clear a rage 
 As any one that trafficked with the stage." 
 
 — Third edition, 1628. 
 
 1628. In Burton's 3rd edition of this year of Anatomy of 
 Melancholy he adds the illustration of " Benedict and Beat- 
 rice " to his former words. " And many times those which 
 at the first sight cannot fancy or affect each other, but are 
 harsh and ready to disagree, offended with each other's 
 carriage (like Benedict and Beatrice in the comedy) [Shake- 
 speare's], 1 in whom they finde many faults ; by the living 
 together in a house, by conference, kissing, colling, and such 
 like allurements, begin at last to dote insensibly upon one 
 another" (Part III. sec. ii., numb. 2, subs. 4.) 2 Other allu- 
 sions also appear to the plays. 
 
 1630. Abraham Cowley's Poetical Revenge, a minor 
 
 poem in " Silva " : — 
 
 " May hee, 
 Bee by his father in his study tooke, 
 At Shakespeare's plays instead of the Lord Cooke." 
 
 1630. John Taylor (the Water- Poet), in his Travels in 
 Bohemia, alludes to Shakspere's seaports there, and in The 
 Praise of Hemp Seed he says : — 
 
 " Spenser and Shakspere did in art excel 
 Sir Edward Dyer, Greene, Nash, Daniel." 
 
 {John Taylor, the Water-Pott, vol. iii.) 
 
 1630. Archy's Banquet of Jests (first printed in 1630) 
 has a story of one travelling through Stratford, "a town 
 
 1 Author's side-note. 
 
 2 In the 1652 edition a printer's error makes this stand Part iii. 
 sect. 2, numb. 3, instead of 2, subs. 4.
 
 150 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 most remarkable for the birth of famous William Shak- 
 spere." 
 
 1630. John Milton's splendid Epitaph, though printed 
 later in the editions of 1632 and 1640, was said to have 
 been written in this year. Coming from a Puritan, printed 
 in the time of Puritan ascendency, it is very powerful in 
 this argument. 
 
 " An Epitaph on the admirable dramatic" poet, William 
 Shakspere : — 
 
 " What needs my Shakspere, for his honoured bones, 
 The labour of an age in piled stones ? 
 Or that his hallowed reliques should be hid 
 Under a star y-pointing pyramid ? 
 Dear son of memory, great heir of fame, 
 What need'st thou such weak witness of th} T name. 
 Thou, in our wonder and astonishment, 
 Hast built thyself a live-long monument. 
 For whilst, to the shame of slow-endeavouring art, 
 Thy easy numbers flow ; and that each heart 
 Hath, from the leaves of thy unvalued book, 
 Those Delphic lines with deep impression took. 
 Then thou, our fancy of itself bereaving, 
 Dost make us marble with too much conceiving. 
 And so sepulchred, in such pomp dost lie, 
 That kings for such a tomb would wish to die." 
 
 (John Milton.) 
 
 1632. Milton also alludes to Shakspere in U Allegro — 
 
 " Then to the well-trod stage anon, 
 If Jonson's learned socks be on ; 
 Or sweetest Shakspere, Fancy's child, 
 Warble his native wood-notes wild." 
 
 1632. The second folio edition repeats the portraits and 
 lines by Jonson. It is printed by Thomas Cotes for Robert 
 Allot ; but the address to Lords Pembroke and Montgomery 
 remain. 
 
 Then comes the lines " Upon the effigies of my worthy 
 friend, the author, Master William Shakspere : —
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 151 
 
 " Spectator, this life's shadow is to see, 
 The truer image of a livelier he. 
 Turn reader ; but observe his comic vaine, 
 Laugh and proceed next to a tragic strain. 
 Then weep, so when thou find'st two contraries, 
 Two different passions from thy rapt soul rise. 
 Say (who alone effect such wonders could) 
 Rare Shakspere to the life thou dost beholde." 
 
 1632. On worthy Master Shakspere and his poems : — 
 
 " A mind reflecting ages past, whose cleere 
 And equal surface can make things appeare 
 Distant a thousand years, and represent 
 Them in their lively colours just extent. . . 
 In that deepe duskie dungeon to discerne 
 A Royal Ghost from Churls ; by art to learne 
 The physiognomie of shades and give 
 Them suddaine birth, wondering how oft they live. 
 What story coldly tells, what poets faine 
 At secondhand, and picture without braine, 
 Senseless and soullesse showes. To give a stage 
 (Ample and true with life) voyce, action, age ; 
 To raise our ancient sovereigns from their hearse ; 
 Make kings his subjects by exchanging verse. . . 
 This and much more, which cannot be exprest 
 But by himselfe, his tongue, and his owne brest, 
 Was Shakespeare's freehold, which his cuning braine 
 Improved by favour of the nine-fold traine. 
 The buskined Muse, the Comick Queen, the grand 
 And louder tone of Clio : nimble hand, 
 And nimbler foote of the melodious paire, 
 The silver-voiced lady, the most faire 
 Calliope, whose speaking silence daunts, 
 And she whose prayse the heavenly body chants. 
 These joyntly woo'd him, envying one another 
 (Obeyed by all as spouse but loved as brother), 
 And wrought a curious robe of sable grave, 
 Fresh greene, and pleasant yellow, red most brave, 
 And constant blew, rich purple, guiltless white, 
 The lowly russet, and the scarlet bright, 
 Brancht and embroidered like the painted spring : 
 Each leaf matched with a flower, and each string
 
 152 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Of golden wire, eacli line of silke : there run 
 Italian workes, whose thread the sisters spun ; 
 And there did sing, or seem to sing, the choyse 
 Birdes of a forrayn note and curious voyce. . . 
 Now when they could no longer him enjoy 
 In mortall garments pent, death may destroy, 
 They say, his body, but his verse shall live. 
 And more than nature takes our hands shall give. 
 In a lesse volume but more strongly bound, 
 Shakspere shall breathe and speake, in laurel crowned 
 Which never fades. Fed with Ambrosian meate, 
 In a well-lined vesture rich and neate, 
 So with this robe they clothe him, bid him weare it, 
 For time shall never staine nor envv teare it." 
 
 — /. M. S. 
 
 The copy of 1632 in the Memorial Library at Stratford 
 has another portrait bound up with it from a later folio 
 than this. The lines under it are also different, being — 
 
 " This Shadowe is renowned Shakespeare's Soule of the Age, 
 The applause, delight, the wonder of the stage. 
 Nature herself was proud of his designes, 
 And joyed to weare the dressing of his lines, 
 Which were so richly spun and woven to fit, 
 As, since, she will vouchsafe no other wit, 
 For ever live the same, the world to tell 
 Thy like no age shall ever parallel." 
 
 1632. Thomas Randolph alludes to Shakspere and to 
 some of his plays : — 
 
 " Did not Will Summers break his wind for thee? 
 And Shakespeare therefore write his Comedy ? 
 All things acknowledge thy vast power divine 
 (Great God of Money), whose most powerful shine 
 Gives motion, life. Day rises from thy sight, 
 Thy setting, though at noon, makes night 
 Sole Catholic cause of what we feel or see, 
 All in this All are but effects of thee." 
 {Hey for Honesty, Down with Knavery. Flay by Thomas 
 Randolph. After Aristophanes, his Plutus.) 
 
 He mentions in this play Pericles, Sir John Oldcastle, Sir
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 15;, 
 
 John Falstaff, and the ghost of Hamlet's father. These poems 
 were not published till later, but Randolph died in 1634. 
 
 1632. " Read Jonson, Shakspere, Beaumont, Fletcher, or 
 Thy neat limned pieces, skilful Massinger." 
 
 (Sir Aston Cokaine, lines prefixed to Massinger.) 
 
 1633. John Hales of Eton, "In a conversation between 
 Sir John Suckling, Sir William Davenant, Endymion Porter, 
 Mr. Hales of Eaton, and Ben Jonson, Sir John Suckling, 
 who was a professed admirer of Shakspere, had undertaken 
 his defence against Ben Jonson with some warmth ; Mr. 
 Hales, who had sat still some time hearing Ben frequently 
 reproaching him with the want of learning and Ignorance 
 of the Antients, told him at last 'that, if Mr. Shakspere 
 had not read the Antients, he had likewise not stolen any- 
 thing from them (a fault that the other made no conscience 
 of), and that if he would produce any one Topick finely 
 treated by any of them, he would undertake to show some- 
 thing upon the same subject, at least as well written, by 
 Shakspere.' " — Bowe's Life. 
 
 1633. A marginal note to William Prynne's Hhtrio- 
 mastix refers to Shakspere's plays as printed on finer paper 
 and more in demand than the Bible. 
 
 " Another Barrister of Lincoln's Inn to the Fellows of 
 Lincoln's Inn. In spite of the statutes of our Kingdom 
 branding all professed stage-plaiers for infamous rogues; 
 and stage-plaiers for unlawful pastimes, yet other Innes of 
 Court permit them, though we do not, having excluded 
 long before these amusements, for feare they should cor- 
 rupt the young students. . . I say the number of Players, 
 Play-books ; Play-haunters, and Play-houses still increas- 
 ing ; there being 40,000 play-bookes printed within these 
 2 years (as the Stationers inform me), they being now 
 more vendible than the choicest sermons. The multitude 
 of our London Play-haunters being so augmented now, that 
 all the ancient Divvels Chapels, for so the Fathers call the 
 Play-houses, are not sufficient, two old Play-houses being also
 
 154 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 lately re-edified, 1 enlarged, and one - new theater erected. 
 Some play-bookes since I first undertook this subject are 
 grown from quarto into folio; which yet bear so good a 
 price and sale, that I cannot but with grief relate it, they 
 are now new printed in far better paper than most octavo 
 or quarto Bibles " (Ben Jonson's, Shakspere's, and others). 
 — To the Christian Reader. 
 
 ..." Note, Shakspere's plays are printed in the best 
 crown paper, far better than most Bibles. Above 40,000 
 play-books have been printed and vented within these last 
 two years." 
 
 1634. William Habington glances at this in his Castara ; 
 To a friend inviting him to a meeting upon promise : — 
 
 May you drinke beare, or that adulterate wine, 
 
 Which makes the zeale of Amsterdam divine, 
 
 If you make breache of promise. I have now 
 
 So rich a sacke, that even yourselfe will bow 
 
 T' adore my Genius. Of this wine should Prynne 
 
 Drinke but a plenteous glasse, he would beginne 
 
 A health to Shakspere's ghost. — Castara. 
 
 1635. I 1 - Heywood's Hierarchy 0/ t/ie Blessed Angels, 
 alluding to the writers and actors being called by their 
 Christian names, specifies "the enchanting quill of melli- 
 fluous Shakspere : — 
 
 Our moderne poets to that passe are driven, 
 Those names are curtailed that they first had ghen . . . 
 Mellifluous Shakspere, whose enchanting quill 
 Commanded mirth and passion, was but 11'///. 
 
 In 1636 Sir John Suckling's Fragmenta Aurea were 
 written, but were printed by a friend to perpetuate his 
 memory in 1646. They contain — 
 
 The sweat of learned Jonson's brain 
 And gentle Shakspere's easier strain. 
 
 1 The Fortune and the Red Bull. 
 
 - The White Friars Theatre. — Author's notes.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 155 
 
 In his Prologue to the Goblins, same year, he says : — 
 
 When Shakspere, Beaumont, Fletcher ruled the stage, 
 There scarce were ten good pallats in the age. 
 More curious cooks than guests ; for men would eat 
 Most heartily of any kind of meat. 
 
 1636. Sir John Suckling's Letters : "We are at length 
 arrived at that river, about the uneven running of which 
 my friend Mr. William Shakspere makes Henry Hotspur 
 quarrel so highly with his fellow-rebels." 
 
 Also : " I must confesse it is a just subject for our 
 sorrow, to hear of any that does quit his station, without 
 his leave that placed him there ; and yet as ill a mine as 
 this act has 'twas a la Romantic; as you may see by a line 
 of Mr. Shakespeare's, who, bringing in Titinius after a lost 
 battel, speaking to his sword, and bidding it find out his 
 his heart, adds : — 
 
 ' By your leave, gods, this is a Roman's part.' ' : 
 
 He also writes A Supplement of an Imperfect Copy of 
 Verses of Mr. Wil. Shakespeare. On Lucrece. 
 
 1637. To the memory of Immortal Ben : — 
 
 " So, in our halcyon days we have had now 
 Wits, to which all that after come must bow ; 
 And should the stage compose herself a crown, 
 Of all those wits which hitherto she has known ; 
 Though there be many that about her brow 
 Like sparkling stones, might a quick lustre throw ; 
 Yet Shakspere, Beaumont, Jonson, these three shall 
 Make up the Cum in the point verticall." 
 
 (Owen Felthain. Jonsonius Yirbius.) 
 
 1637. " Shakspere may make grief merry ; Beaumont's stile 
 Ravish, and melt anger into a smile. 
 In winter nights or after meals they be, 
 I must confess, very good company ; 
 But thou exact'st our best hour's industry, 
 ^\ t; may read them, we ought to study thee." 
 
 (Richard West, Jonsonius Yirbius.)
 
 156 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 1637. "What are his faults (0 Envy) that you speake 
 English at court, the learned stage acts Greek ; 
 That Latine hee reduced and could command 
 That which your Shakspere scarce could understand." 
 
 (H. Ramsay, Jonsnnius Virbius.) 
 
 1637. To the memory of Jonson, by Jasper Mayne : — 
 
 " Though the priest had translated for that time 
 The Liturgy, and buried thee in rime, 
 So that in meter we had heard it said, 
 Poetique dust is to poetique laid ; 
 
 And though that dust being Shakspere's thou mightst have 
 Not his roome, but the Poet for thy grave. . . . 
 So that, as thou didst Prince of numbers die 
 And live, so now thou mightst in numbers lie 
 'Twere frail solemnity. . . . 
 Who without Latine helps hadst been as rare 
 As Beaumont, Eletcher, or as Shakspere were ; 
 And, like them, from thy native stock couldst sa}', 
 Poets and kings are not born every day." 
 
 (Jonsonius Virbius.) 
 
 1637. J. Terrent, Jonsonius Virbius — 
 
 " Nee geminos vates ; nee te Shakspeare silebo 
 Aut quicquid sacri nostros conjecit in annos 
 Conselium Fati." 
 
 1637. Samuel Holland's Don Zara del Fogo (not printed 
 till 1656) mentions that "Shakspere and others were will- 
 ing to water their bays with their blood rather than part 
 with their proper right." 
 
 1637. Manuscript commonplace book of Abraham 
 Wright, vicar of Okeham in Rutlandshire, speaks of 
 "Othello" by Shakspere. 
 
 1638. James Mervyn prefixed to Shirley's Royal Mas- 
 ter : — 
 
 "That limbus I could have believed thy brain 
 Where Beaumont, Fletcher, Shakspere, and a traine 
 Of glorious poets in their active heate 
 Move in that orbe as in their former seate. . . . 
 Each casting in his dose. Beaumont his weight, 
 Shakspere his mirth, and Fletcher his conceit."
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 157 
 
 1638. Richard Brome, in Antipodes, acted in this year, 
 but printed in 1640 — 
 
 " These lads can act the Emperors' lives all over, 
 And Shakespeare's chronicled histories to boot, 
 And were that Cassar, or that English Earle 
 That lov'd a play and player so well, now living, 
 I would not be outvied in my delights." 
 
 1638. Davenant's Ode, published along with Madagascar 
 and other poems, see page 144. 
 
 1639. " Robert Chamberlain. One asked another what 
 Shakespeare's works were worth all being bound together. 
 He answered, not a farthing. Not worth a farthing, said 
 he, why so ? He answered that his playes were worth a 
 great deale of money, but he never heard that his works 
 were worth anything at all." — Conceits, Clinches, Flashes, 
 and Whimsies. 
 
 1640. Thomas Bancroft to Shakspere : — 
 
 " Thy muse's sugared dainties seem to us 
 Like the famed apples of old Tantalus ; 
 For we (admiring) see and hear thy straines, 
 But none I see or heare those sweets attaines. . . . 
 Thou hast so used thy pen or (shooke thy speare), 
 That poets startle, nor thy wit come neere." 
 
 (Two bookcs of Epigrammes and Epitaphs.) 
 
 1640. The i2mo edition of the poems of Shakspere 
 gives new testimonials : — 
 
 To the Reader, — I here presume under favour to present 
 to your view some excellent and sweetely composed poems 
 of Master William Shakspere, which in themselves appeare 
 of the same purity, the Authour himselfe then living 
 avouched ; they had not the fortune by reason of their 
 Infancie in his death, to have the due acomodation of 
 proportionable glory with the rest of his ever living works, 
 yet the lines of themselves will afford you a more authen- 
 tick approbation than my assurance any way can, to invite 
 your allowance, in your perusall you shall finde them seren,
 
 158 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 cleere and elegantly plaine, such gentle straines as shall 
 recreate and not perplexe your braine, no intricate or 
 cloudy stuff to puzzell your intellect, but perfect- eloquence, 
 such as will raise your admiration to his praise : this 
 assurance I know will not differ from your acknowledg- 
 ment. And certain I am my opinion will be seconded by 
 the sufficiency of these ensuing lines. I have been some- 
 what solicitous to bring this forth to the perfect view of 
 all men, and in so doing, glad to be serviceable for the 
 continuance of glory to the deserved Author in these his 
 poems. John Benson. 
 
 Of Mr. William Shakspere. 
 
 What, lofty Shakspere, art again revived ? 
 And virbius-like now show'st thyself twice-lived 
 'Tis love that thus to thee is showne 
 The labours his, the glory still thine owne. 
 These learned poems amongst thine after-birth 
 That makes thy name immortall on the earth 
 
 Will make the learned still admire to see 
 The muses' gifts so full, infused on thee. 
 Let carping Momus barke, and bite his fill, 
 And ignorant Davus slight thy learned skill. 1 
 Yet those who know the worth of thy desert, 
 And with true judgment can discern thy art, 
 Will be admirers of thy high-tuned straine, 
 Amongst whose number let me still remain. 
 
 John Warren. 
 
 Upon Master William Shakspere. 
 
 Poets are borne not made, when I would prove 
 This truth, the glad remembrance I must love 
 Of never dying Shakspere who alone 
 Is argument enough to prove that one. 
 First that he was a poet none could doubt, 
 That heard the applause of what he sees set out 
 Imprimed ; where thou hast (I will not say) 
 Reader, his workes for to contrive a play ; 
 
 1 There were some carpers even in those days.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 159 
 
 (To him 'twas none) the patterne of all wit 
 
 Art- without art unparalleled as yet. 
 
 Next Nature onely helpt him, for looke thorow 
 
 This whole booke thou shalt finde he doth not borowe. 
 
 One phrase from Greekes nor Latines imitate, 
 
 Nor once from vulgar languages translate, 
 
 Nor plagiari-like from others gleane, 
 
 Nor begges he from each witty friend a scene 
 
 To piece his Acts with ; all that he doth write 
 
 Is pure his owne, plot, language, exquisite. 
 
 Then vanish upstart Writers to each stage, 
 
 You needy Poetasters of this age. . . . 
 
 I doe not wonder when you offer at 
 
 Black-Friers, that you suffer, 'tis the fate 
 
 Of richer veines, prime judgments that have fared 
 
 The worse with this deceased man compared. 
 
 So have I seene, when C&sar would appeare 
 
 And on the stage at half-sword parley were 
 
 Brutus and Cassius ; oh, how the audience 
 
 Were ravished, with what wonder they went thence, 
 
 When some new day they would not brook a line 
 
 Of tedius, though well-laboured Catiline. 
 
 Sejanus, too, was irksome, they prized more 
 
 Honest Iago or the jealous Moore. 
 
 And though the Fox and subtle Alchemist 
 
 Long intermitted, could not quite be mist, 
 
 Though these have shamed all Ancients, and might raise 
 
 Their authours' merit with a crown of Bayes. 
 
 Yet these sometimes, even at a friend's desire, 
 
 Acted, have scarce defrayed the sea-cole fire, 
 
 And doore-keepers ; when let but Falstaffe come, 
 
 Hal, Poines, the rest, you scarce shall have a roome. 
 
 All is so pestered ; let but Beatrice 
 
 And Benedicke be seene ; loe, in a trice 
 
 The cockpit, galleries, boxes, all are full 
 
 To heare Malvoglio, that cross-gartered gull, 
 
 Briefe, there is nothing in his wit-fraught booke, 
 
 Whose sound we would not heare, or whose worth looke 
 
 Like old coynd gold, whose lines in every page 
 
 Shall passe true currant to succeeding age. 
 
 Leonard Digges. 
 
 1640. After the elegies by J. M. and W. B., reprinted
 
 160 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 from the 1632 edition, comes "An Elegie on the Death 
 of that famous Writer and Actor, Mr. William Shak- 
 spere : " — 
 
 . . . Let learned Johnson sing a dirge for thee, 
 
 And fill our Orbe with mournful harmony. 
 
 But we neede no remembrancer, thy fame 
 
 Shall still accompany thy honoured name 
 
 To all posterity, and make us be 
 
 Sensible of what we lost in losing thee. 
 
 Being the Age's wonder, whose smooth rhymes 
 
 Did more reforme than lash the looser times. 
 
 Nature herselfe did her own selfe admire, 
 
 As oft as thou wert pleased to attire 
 
 Her in her native lusture and confesse 
 
 Thy dressing was her chiefest comlinesse. 
 
 How can we then forget thee, when the age, 
 
 Her chiefest tutor, and the widdow'd stage. 
 
 Her onely favourite in thee hath lost ; 
 
 And Nature's selfe, what she did bragge of most. 
 
 Sleep then, rich Soule of numbers, whilst poor we, 
 
 Enjoy the profits of thy legacie. 
 
 And think it happinesse enough we have 
 
 So much of thee redeemed from the grave 
 
 As may suffice to enlighten future times, 
 
 With the bright lustre of thy matchless rhimes. Anon. 
 
 1640. To Mr. William Shakspere : — 
 
 " Shakespeare, we must be silent in thy praise, 
 'Cause our encomiums will but blast thy bays, 
 Which envy could not, that thou didst so well. 
 Let thine own histories prove a chronicle." Anon. 
 
 ( Witt's Recreations, selected from Finest Fancies of 
 Modern Muses.) 
 
 1640. Poems. 
 
 TO HIS MISTRIS SHADE. 
 
 Then soft Catullus, sharpe fanged Martiall 
 And towering Lucan, Horace, Juvenall, 
 And snakie Perseus ; these and those whose ra^e 
 (Dropt from the jarre of heaven) filled to enrage 
 All times unto their phrensies, thou shalt there 
 Behold them in an Amphitheatre,
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 161 
 
 Amongst which Synod crowned with sacred bayes, 
 
 And flattering joy weele have to recite their playes — 
 
 Shakespeare and Beaumond, Swannes to whom the spheres 
 
 Listen, while they call backe the former yeares. 
 
 To teach the truth of Scenes, and more for thee 
 
 There yet remaines, brave soule than thou canst see 
 
 By glimmering of a fancie : doe but come 
 
 And there lie shew thee that illustrious roorne 
 
 In which thy father Johnson shall be placed 
 
 As in a globe of radiant fire, and graced 
 
 So he of that high Hyrarchy, where none 
 
 But brave soules take illumination 
 
 Immediately from heaven. 
 
 " An addition of some excellent Poems to those precedent of re- 
 nowned Shakespeare, by other Gentlemen." 
 
 Bound at the end of the 1640 edition. See British 
 Museum. 
 
 1642. Charles Butler, Vicar of Wotton, in this year 
 produced his 2nd edition, in Latin, of his Bhetorica, Libri 
 Duo. Quorem Prior de Tropis et Figuris, Postirior de Voce 
 et Gestu prsccepit : in usuum scholarum postremo recog- 
 nita, Quibus recens acesserunt de oratoria Libri duo. Lib. 
 I. cap. 13. The 1st edition, London 1629, has not this 
 Shakesperean passage : — " The kinds of rhythm may be 
 distinguished partly by the number of their syllables, partly 
 by the different arrangement of the echoing sounds ; but 
 observation of the best poets teaches these things best. 
 
 "Such among us, fit to be compared to Homer, Virgil, Ovid, and 
 others of the better ancient fame, are Sir Philip Sydney, Edmund 
 Spenser, Samuel Daniel, Michael Drayton, Joshuah Sylvester, the 
 naturally serious Francis Quarles, and he whom I name with honour, 
 that divine poet, George Wither, and others now eminent in genius 
 and in skill, of whom this age is most fruitful. To whom is added of 
 the dramatic poets, in no whit inferior to Seneca, Plautus, Terence — 
 the tragi-comic-historic William Shakespeare ; and not a few professing 
 that special art."— Lucy Toclmin Smith, trans, edit. Dr. Ingleby's 
 Centurie of Pray se. 
 
 1 64 1. John Johnson speaks of Shakspere as being read
 
 162 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 secretly at night by young people, "The Academy of 
 Love." 
 
 1 641. Martin Parker in this year writes : 
 
 " All poets, as addition to their fames, ' 
 Have by their works eternized their names, 
 As Chaucer, Spenser, and that noble Earl 
 Of Surrie thought it the most precious pearle 
 That decked his honour to subscribe to what 
 His high ingenue ever aimed at. 
 Sydney and Shakespeare, Drayton, Withers, and 
 Renowned Jonson, glory of our land." 
 
 1 64 1. There appears this year a complaint of poor 
 players out of occupation because of the plague — and doubt- 
 less, also, Puritan ascendency. This factor in public 
 opinion cannot be ignored in any critical review of the 
 period. 
 
 1642. James Shirley, Prologue to The Sisters. 
 
 " You see 
 What audience we have, what company 
 To Shakspere comes, whose mirth did once beguile, 
 Dull hours, and buskined, made even sorrow smile, 
 So lovely were the wounds that men could say, 
 They could endure the bleeding the whole day, 
 He has but few friends lately, think of that ! " 
 
 1643. Sir Richard Baker's Chronicle says : — 
 
 "For writers of Plays, and such as had been Players themselves, 
 William Shakspere and Benjamin Jonson have specially left their 
 names recommended to posteritie." 
 
 1644. Dugdale in his Warwickshire : — "One thing more 
 in relation to this ancient town of Stratford is observable, 
 that it gave birth and sepulture to our late famous poet, 
 Will Shakespeare, whose monument I have inserted in my 
 discourse of the church." 
 
 1644. Mercurius Britannicus, No. 20, gives an account of 
 the misfortunes befalling a man who edited a Sunday news-
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 163 
 
 paper : — '•' Aulicus " is " a wofull spectacle ami object of clul- 
 nesse and tribulation, not to be recovered by the Protestant 
 or Catholique liquor, either ale or strong beer, or sack or 
 claret, or hippocras, or muscadine, or rosalpis, which has 
 been reputed formerly by his grandfather, Ben Jonson, and 
 his uncle, Shakspere, and his cowzen Germains, Beaumont 
 and Fletcher, the onely blossoms for the brain, the restora- 
 tives for the wit, the bathing for the nine muses ; but 
 none of these are now able either to warm him into a 
 quibble, or to inflame him into a sparkle of invention, and 
 all this because he hath prophaned the Sabbath by his 
 pen." 
 
 1644. Vindex Anglicanus : — " There is no sort of verse, 
 either ancient or modern, which we are not able to equal 
 by imitation. We have our English Virgil, Seneca, Lucan, 
 Juvenal, Martial, and Catullus ; in the Earl of Surrey, 
 Daniel, Jonson, Spenser, Don, Shakespeare, and the glory 
 of the rest, Sandys and Sydney." — Dr. Furnival's Col- 
 lection. 
 
 1644-5. The great Assises holden in Parnassus by Apollo 
 and Ms Assessours, at which sessions are arraigned the news 
 papers of the time. 
 
 In this one point I must specially notice the peculiar 
 manner the Baconians have of disobeying their great 
 master, to seek after " negative instances " of any opinion 
 one may hold. They bring forward the title-page to prove 
 that Bacon was set high above Shakspere, and only next 
 Apollo, and therefore the author of the plays, and they 
 withhold the contents. 
 
 Lord Verulam is Chancellor, as fitted his office, and 
 placed among the learned men, who have also benefited by 
 the printer's art. Shakspere is placed among the jurors, 
 as a poet among poets. Joseph Scaliger, the Censor, tells 
 Apollo, considering typography : — 
 
 " This instrument of Art is now possest 
 By some who have in Art no interest."
 
 164 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Apollo sends for Torquato Tasso with troops to bring in 
 all that had defiled the Press with scurrilous pamphlets, to 
 
 " Where Phoebus on his high tribunall sate, 
 With his assessours in triumphant state, 
 Sage Verulam, sublimed for science great, 
 As Chancellor, next him had the first seat." 
 
 The others were arranged in order of consideration of 
 their learning, and the amount of detraction they had 
 suffered at the hands of the various newspapers of the 
 time. Jonson was made the keeper or jailor. He first 
 brought forth " Mercurius Britannicus." Then the jury 
 was impanelled, twelve good men : — 
 
 " Hee who was called first in all the list, 
 George Withers hight, entitled satyrist ; 
 Then Cary, May, and Davenant were called forth. 
 Renowned poets all and men of worth, 
 If wit may passe for worth. Then Sylvester, 
 Sands, Drayton, Beaumont, Fletcher, Massinger, 
 Shakespeare and Heywood, poets good and free ; 
 Dramatic writers all but the first three. 
 These were empanelled all, and, being sworne, 
 A just and perfect verdict to returne. . . . 
 Then Edmund Spenser, Clerke of the Assize, 
 Read the endictment loud, which did comprise 
 Matters of scandall and contempt extreme, 
 Done 'gainst the Dignity and Diademe 
 Of great Apollo, and that legal course 
 Which throughout all Parnassus was in force." 
 
 The prisoner, Mercurius Pmtannicus, pleads not guilty, 
 and requests the jurors' names to be read over again, 
 excepting to George Withers on the plea that he himself 
 was "a cruel satyrist." He next tried to set aside two 
 other able jurors, on the plea they were translators : — 
 
 "Deserving Sands and gentle Sylvester." 
 
 But Apollo judges that translators can be poets. The next 
 culprit, Mercurius Aulicus, is blamed for bringing in the
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 165 
 
 exploded doctrine of the Florentine Machiavelli. He objects 
 to the juror May, because, though a poet, he " cannot trust 
 his truth." Another prisoner objects to other jurors, but 
 Apollo quenches him : — 
 
 " He should be tried 
 By twelve who were sufficient men and fit, 
 Both for integrity and pregnant wit." 
 
 Bribery is attempted, but Apollo scorns it, and puts the 
 briber in prison under " Honest Ben." Another prisoner 
 objects to Cary for a " luxurious pen " " with foule con- 
 ceits." The last prisoner objected : — 
 
 " By Histrionicke Poets to be tryed, 
 'Gainst whom he thus maliciously enveighed. 
 Shakspere's a mimicke, Massinger a sot, 
 Heywood for Aganippe takes a plot, 
 Beaumont and Fletcher make one poet ; they 
 Single dare not adventure on a play. . . . 
 Thus spake the prisoner, then among the crowd 
 Plautus and Terence 'gan to mutter loud, 
 And old Menander was but ill-apayd, 
 While Aristophanes his wrath bewrayed 
 With words opprobrius, for it galled him shrewdly 
 To see dramatic poets taxed so lewdly." 
 
 Another prisoner, Spye, objects to Drayton. Apollo is 
 indignant : — 
 
 !-<• 
 
 " How boldly hath this proud traducing Spye 
 And his comrades our honest poets checkt, 
 Who from the best have ever found respect." 
 
 There is nothing for Bacon — all for Shakspere here. 
 1645. Paul Aylward to his deere friend Mr. Henry 
 Burkhead upon his Tragedy of Cola's Fury or Lirenda's 
 
 Miserie : — 
 
 "The fame declines 
 Of ne're enough-praised Shakespeare if thy lines 
 Come to be published."
 
 1 66 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 1645. Daniel Breecly to the same : — 
 
 " Deere frend, since then this peece so well limned 
 As most would thinke 'twas by Ben Jonson trimmed, 
 That Shakespeare, Fletcher, and all did combine 
 To make Lirenda through the Clouds to shine." 
 
 1646. S. Shepherd, in The Time* displayed in Six 
 Sestiads, says : — 
 
 " See him whose tragic scean Euripides 
 Doth equal, and with Sophocles we may 
 Compare great Shakspere." 
 
 1647. George Daniel of Beswick : — 
 
 " Though Shakespeare, Story, and Fox legend write " • ■ - m 
 
 Again : 
 
 "To the Sceane and Act 
 Read Comicke Shakespeare ; or, if you would give 
 Praise to a just desert, crowning the stage, 
 See Beaumont, once the honour of his age " — 
 
 (Poems, Vindication of Poetry, Dr. Grosart's Collection.) 
 
 1647. "'Twixt Jonson's grave and Shakespeare's lighter sound 
 
 His muse so steered, that something still was found . . . 
 
 Shakespeare to thee was dull, whose best wit lies 
 
 I' the Lady's question and the Fool's replies, 
 
 Old fashioned wit, which walked from town to town." 
 
 (William Cartwright on Fletcher.) 
 
 1647. "The flowing compositions of the then-expired Sweet Swan of 
 
 Avon — Shakspere." 
 
 (James Shirley, Dedicatory Epistle of Ten Players, 
 
 Beaumont and Fletcher's Works.) 
 
 1647. " When Jonson, Shakspere, and thyself did sit 
 And swayed in the triumvirate of wit, 
 Yet what from Jonson's oyle and sweat did flow, 
 Or what more easy nature did bestow 
 On Shakspere's gentler muse, in thee full-growne, 
 Their graces doth appeare." 
 
 (Sir John Denham on Fletcher.) 
 
 Others also connect these names.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 167 
 
 1647. James Howell : — 
 
 " Had now grim Ben bin breathing, with what rage, 
 And high swoln fury had Hee lashed this age, 
 Shakespeare with Chapman had grown madd, and torn 
 Their gentle Sock, and lofty Buskins worne — 
 To make their muse welter up to the chin 
 In blood." 
 
 (Commendatory verses on Fletcher's Dramas.) 
 
 1647. Sir George Buck : — 
 
 " Let Shakespeare, Chapman, and applauded Ben 
 Weare the eternal merit of their pen. 
 Here I am sicke : and were I to choose 
 A mistris co-rival, 'tis Fletcher's muse. 
 
 (1st edition Fletcher's Works.) 
 
 1648. Wednesday, 2 7th December. Parliamentary notices: 
 — " The King is pretty merry, and spends much time in read- 
 ing of sermon-books, and sometimes Shakespeare's and Ben 
 Jonson's plays." 
 
 1649. Milton in EikonoMastes also says that " Shakspere 
 was the closet companion of Charles." 
 
 1649. As also said J. Cooke, Appeal to all Rational Men, 
 on King Charles's trial, " Had King Charles but studied 
 Scripture half so much as Ben Jonson or Shakespeare, he 
 would have learned that Hezekiah," &c. 
 
 1649. The epitaph upon his daughter, Mrs. Susanna 
 Hall, shows the estimation of his character by his surviving 
 relatives : — 
 
 " Here lyeth ye body of Susanna, wife to John Hall, Gent., ye 
 daughter of William Shakspere, Cent. She deceased ye nth of July, 
 a.d. 1649, a g G d 66. 
 
 " Witty above her sexe, but that's not all — 
 Wise to salvation was good Mistress Hall. 
 Something of Shakspere was in that, but this 
 Wholy of Him with whom she's now in blisse. 
 Then, passenger, hast ne'ere a teare 
 To weepe with her, that wept with all ?
 
 i6S THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 That wept, yet set herself to chere 
 Them up with comfort's cordiall. 
 Her love shall live, her mercy spread 
 When thou hast ne'er a tear to shed." 
 
 1650. " Then Petrarch, Sydney, none can move 
 Shakespeare out of Adonis' grove ; 
 There sullenly he sits ; but these 
 Admire thy novel rhapsodies." 
 
 Samuel Sheppard to Anthony Davenport. 
 
 1650. Also Samuel Sheppard on Davenport's play of The 
 Pirate : — 
 
 " Thou rival'st Shakespeare, though thy glory's less." 
 
 165 1. Again he says, "Shakespeare trod on Enyli.^h 
 earth," &c., and in another dedicatory poem : — 
 
 " Fletcher and Beaumont, who so wrot 
 Johnson's fame, was soon forgot, 
 Shakespeare no glory was allowed, 
 His sun still shrank beneath a cloud." 
 
 1 65 1. Samuel Sheppard, in his Epigrams, includes one 
 on Shakspere : — 
 
 " I. Sacred Spirit, while thy lyre 
 
 Echoed o'er the Arcadian plains 
 Even Apollo did admire, 
 
 Orpheus wondered at thy strain-. 
 
 3. Who wrote his lines with a sunbeame, 
 
 More durable than Time or Eate ; 
 Others boldly do blaspheme, 
 
 Like those who seem to preach, but prate. 
 
 4. Thou wert truly priest-elect, 
 
 Chosen darling to the nine, 
 Such a trophy to erect 
 By thy wit and skill divine. 
 
 5. That were all their other glories 
 
 (Thine excepted) torn away, 
 By thine admirable stories 
 Their garments ever shall be gay.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 169 
 
 6. Where thy honoured bones do lie, 
 As Statius once to Maro's urn, 
 Thither every year will I 
 
 Slowly tread and sadly turn." 
 
 1 65 1. Jasper Mayne. Prefixed to William Cartwright's 
 Plays : — 
 
 " For thou to nature hadst joined Art and Skill, 
 In thee Ben Jonson still held Shakespeare's Quill, 
 A quill ruled by sharp judgment, and such laws 
 As a well-studied mind and reason draws." 
 
 1651. " Shakespeare's Othello, Johnson's Catiline, 
 
 Would lose their lustre, were thy Albovine 
 Placed betwixt them." — From the same. 
 
 165 1. William Bell speaks of — 
 
 " Hey wood's old iron, Shakespeare's Alchemy." 
 
 1 65 1. J. S. : — " The true and primary intent of the Trage- 
 dians and Commedians of old, was to magnify Virtue, and 
 to depress Vice : And you may observe throughout the 
 works of incomparable Johnson, excellent Shakespeare, and 
 elegant Fletcher, <fcc. — they, (however vituperated by some 
 streight-laced brethren not capable of their sublimity) aim 
 at no other end." (An excellent Comedy called The Prince 
 of Priggs Revel*, Address to the Reader.) 
 
 1652. Jo. Tatham, commendatory verses prefixed to 
 Richard Brome's The Merry Beggars .•— 
 
 " But Shakespeare, the Plebean Driller, was 
 Founder'd in 's Pericles, and must not pass." 
 
 1652. A Hermeticall Banquet, drest by a Spagiricall 
 
 Cooke : — 
 
 "Poetais her minion, to whom she (Eloquentia) resigns the whole 
 government of her family. Ovid she makes Major Domo ; Hoc 
 because a merry Greek, Master of the Wine-cellars ; Shakspere, 
 Butler; Ben Jonson, Clerk of the Kitchen: [Tenner, his Turnspit; 
 and Taylor, his scullion."
 
 i;o THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 1653. Sir Richard Baker's Chronicles, another edition : — 
 
 " Richard Burbage ami Edward Alleyne — two such actors as no age 
 must ever look to see the like. . . . For writers of plays, and such as 
 had been players themselves, William Shakspere and Benjaman Jon- 
 son, have specially left their names recommended to posterity." 
 
 1653. Sir Aston Cokaine, Prelude to Broivn's Plays: — 
 
 "Shakspere (more rich in humours) entertaine 
 The crowded Theatres with his happy vaine." 
 
 1654. Henry Vaughan's sacred poems say that George 
 Herbert's poems gave the first check to Shakspere, " a most 
 flourishing and advanced wit" of his time. It was the 
 Puritan period. 
 
 Henry Vaughan, Silurist, born 162 1 ; he wrote poems in 
 1646; published them with preface, September 1654, in 
 which "The First that with any effectual success attempted 
 a diversion of this foul and overflowing stream, was the 
 blessed man Mr. George Herbert, whose holy life and verse 
 gained many pious converts, of whom I am the least, and 
 gave the first check to a most flourishing and admired wit 
 of his times." 
 
 George Herbert was born 1593 ; was made public orator, 
 Cambridge, 1619; published poems, previously written, 1633. 
 
 1654. Edmund Gay ton's pleasant Notes upon Don 
 Quixote alludes to Shakspere and his plays several times ; 
 but clearly says, " Let Englishmen write of their owne wits, 
 their fancies, subjects, disputes, sermons, histories, romances, 
 are as good, vigorous, lasting, and as well worthy reading 
 as any in the world. Our Faery Queene, the Arcadia, 
 Drayton, Beaumont and Fletcher, Shakespeare, Johnson, 
 Randolph, and lastly Gondibert, are of eternal fame." 
 
 1655. The Hectors, or The False Challenge, a comedy. 
 " Mrs. Love-ivit : Sometimes to your wife you may read a 
 piece of Shakespeare, Suckling, and Ben Jonson too, if you 
 can understand him." — Dr. I/ujleb;/ (Anonymous).
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 171 
 
 1656. Samuel Holland, Wit and Fancy in a Maze : — 
 
 "Behold Shakspere and Fletcher appeared (bringing with them a 
 strong party) as if they meant to water the bays with bioud, rather 
 than part with their proper right, which indeed Apollo and the Muses 
 had (with much justice) conferred upon thein, so that now there is 
 likely to be a trouble in Triplex. . . . Shakspere and Fletcher, sur- 
 rounded with their life-guard— viz., Gosse, Massinger, Decker, Webster, 
 Suckling, Cartwright, Carevv." 
 
 1656. Abraham Cowley, in the author's preface to his 
 poems, says, " That 'many writers have had their works 
 stuffed out by the publishers, as has .been done with Shake- 
 speare, Jonson, and many others." 
 
 1658. Sir Aston Cokaine to Mr. John Honeyman :— 
 " Lessen the loss of Shakespeare's death by thy successful 
 pen and fortunate phantasie." 
 
 1658. In verses to Mr. Clement Fisher of Wincot. 
 accompanying his Small Poems, Sir Aston Cokaine says : — 
 
 " Shakspere, your Wincot Ale hath much renowned, 
 That fox'd a beggar so (by chance was founde 
 Sleeping), that there needed not many a word 
 To make him to believe he was a Lord ; 
 But you affirm (and in it seem most eager) 
 'Twill make a Lord as drunk as any beggar. 
 Bid Norton brew such Ale as Shakspere fancies 
 Did put Kit Sly into such Lordly trances, 
 And let us meet there (for a fit of Gladnesse), 
 And drink ourselves merry in sober sadness." 
 
 Also, 
 
 " Now, Stratford-upon-Avon, we would choose 
 Thy gentle and ingenuous Shakspere Muse. . . . 
 Our Warwickshire the heart of England is, 
 As you most evidently have proved by this ; 
 Having it with more spirit dignified 
 Than all our English counties are beside." 
 
 To my worthy and learned friend Mr. Dugdale 
 upon his Warwickshire Illustrated. 
 
 1658. Anonymous. To the Readers. Prefixed to live 
 new Playes by Richard Brome : —
 
 1 72 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 " There are a sort who think they lessen this Author's 
 worth when they speak the relation he had to Ben Jonson. 
 We very thankfully embrace the objection, and desire they 
 would name any other Maister that could better teach a 
 man to write a good play. . . . We have here prefixed Ben 
 Jonson's own testimony to his servant our Author ; we 
 grant it is (according to Ben's own nature and custome) 
 magisterial enough ; and who looks for other, since he said 
 to Shakespeare — ' I shall draw envy on thy name ' (by 
 writing in his praise), and threw in his face small Latine 
 and less Greek ! " 
 
 1658. " To thee compared, our English poets all stop 
 
 An' vail their bonnets, even Shakespeare's Falstop," i.e. 
 Falstaff. 
 
 (Samuel Anstie's Naps upon Parnassus). 
 
 1660. Elegie on R. Lovelace : — 
 " Where each man's Love and Fancy shall be try'd 
 As when great Johnson or brave Shakespeare dyed." 
 
 1660. Restoration. 
 
 1660. (Circa.) Richard Flecknoe writes : — 
 
 " In this time Poets and Actors were in their greatest flourish, Jonson, 
 Shakespear, with Beaumont and Fletcher, their Poets ; and Field and 
 Burbidge their actors. 
 
 " For playes, Shakspere was one of the first who inverted the 
 Dramatic Stile, from dull History to quick Comedy, . . . upon whom 
 Jonson refined. 
 
 "Another said of Shakespeare's writings 'that it was a fine garden 
 but wanted weeding." 
 
 " Shakespeare excelled in a natural vein, Fletcher in wit, and 
 Johnson in gravity and ponderousness of style, . . . Comparing him 
 with Shakespeare, you shall see the difference betwixt Nature and Art." 
 
 (Essays on the English Stagt .) 
 
 1660. Sir Richard Baker's Chronicle of England, "Where- 
 unto is now added in this 3rd edition, the reign of King 
 Charles I." :— 
 
 " Poetry was never more resplendent, nor more graced ; wherein 
 Jonson, Silvester, Shakspere, &c, not only excelled their own country- 
 men, but the whole world beside."
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 173 
 
 1662. Fuller's Worthies, under Warwickshire, has : — 
 
 " William Shakspere was born at Stratford-on-Avon in this county ; 
 in whom three eminent poets may seem to be confounded. 1. Martial, 
 in the warlike sound of his surname (whence some conjecture him of a 
 military extraction). Hastivibrans or Shakspere. 2. Ovid, the most 
 natural and witty of all poets. 3. Plautus, who was an exact comedian, 
 yet never any scholar, as our Shakspere (if alive) would confess him- 
 self. Add to all these, that though his genius generally was jocular, 
 and inclining him to festivity, yet he could, when so disposed, be 
 solemn and serious, as appears by his tragedies ; so that Heraclitus 
 himself (I mean if secret and unseen) might afford to smile at his 
 comedies, they were so merry ; and Democritus scarce forbear to sigh 
 at his tragedies, they were so mournful. He was an eminent instance 
 of the truth of that rule, Poeta nonfit sed nascitur. [One is not made, 
 but born a poet.] Indeed, his learning was very little. . . . Nature 
 itself was all the art which was used upon him. Many were the wit 
 combats betwixt him and Ben Jonson, which two I beheld like a 
 Spanish great galleon and an English man-of-war. Master Jonson, 
 like the former, was built far higher in learning, solid but slow in his 
 performances ; Shakspere, like the English man-of-war, lesser in bulk, 
 but lighter in sailing, could turn with all tides, tack about, and take 
 advantage of all winds, by the quickness of his wit and invention." 1 
 
 1 648- 1 679. Diary of Rev. J. Ward, Vicar of Strat- 
 ford : — " I have heard that Mr. Shakespeare was a natural 
 wit, without any art at all. . . . Shakespeare frequented the 
 plays all his younger time, but in his elder days lived at 
 Stratford, and supplied the stage with two plays every 
 year, and for it had an allowance so large that he spent 
 at the rate of ^1000 a year, as I have heard. 
 
 " Ptemember to peruse Shakespeare's Plays and bee versed 
 in them, yt that I may not be ignorant in the matter. . . . 
 Shakespeare, Drayton, and Ben Jonson had a merrie meet- 
 ing, and itt seems drank too hard, for Shakespeare died of a 
 fcavour there contracted. . . . Whether Dr. Heylin does 
 
 1 " What things we have seen 
 
 Done at the Mermaid. Heard words that have been 
 So nimble and so full of subtle flame, 
 As if that every one from whom they came 
 Had meant to put his whole soul in a jest. 
 
 (Beaumont's "Lines on the Mermaid Tavern.")
 
 174 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 well in reckoning up the dramatic poets which have been 
 famous in England, to omit Shakespeare % . . . A letter to 
 my brother to see Mrs. Quiney," i.e. Judith Shakespeare. 
 
 1 661-1663. Pepys' Diary speaks of the revival of Shak- 
 spere's Plays. 
 
 1663. "Not unlike Falstaffe in Shakespeare." — Hvdi- 
 hras, 2nd part, Anonymous. 
 
 1664. 1 Another folio edition of Shakspere's works have 
 the same verses attached in different order, and the same 
 portrait as the 1632 one. But it has seven other plays 
 added, said to have been written by Shakspere, namely, 
 Pericles, The London Prodigall, The History of Thomas 
 Lord Cromicell, Sir John Oldcastle, The Puritan Widow, A 
 Yorkshire Tragedy, Locrine, all now believed to be spurious. 
 The copy in the British Museum has some early manu- 
 script notes added, which ascribe still other poems to 
 Shakspere, but makes many errors. It also speaks of a 
 quarto edition of the Plays in 1639. It may be interesting 
 to some to have these notes, apparently from the Poetical 
 Register, Historical Account : — 
 
 " Mr. William Shakespeare was son of Mr. John Shake- 
 speare, and born on Stratford-on-Avon in 1564. His 
 family, as it appears by the registers and publick writings 
 relating to the town, were of good figure and fashion there, 
 and are mentioned as gentlemen. 
 
 " The latter part of his life was spent, as all men of good 
 sense will wish theirs may be, in ease, retirement, and the 
 conversation of his friends. He had the good fortune to 
 gather an estate equal to this occasion, and in that to his 
 wish ; and is said to have spent some years before his 
 death at his native place in Stratford. His pleasurable 
 wit, good nature, and most agreeable conversation, engaged 
 him here in the acquaintance and intituled him to the 
 
 1 Some copies of the 1664 edition are dated 1663, and do not contain 
 these extra plays, and in some a space is left in the title-page for the 
 portrait.
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 175 
 
 friendship of the gentlemen of the neighbourhood, who had 
 a true taste of wit and merit, as it had done at London, 
 whilst he attended on the stap/e. He died Anno Dom. 1616, 
 in the fifty-third year of his age, and was buried on the north 
 side of the Chancel in the great Church of Stratford, where 
 a monument is placed in the wall, representing his statue 
 leaning on a cushion with these inscriptions. . . . 
 
 " Besides the plays collected in this volume, I find men- 
 tioned The Two Noble Kinsmen, by John Fletcher and 
 William Shakespear, imprinted 1634. Mr. Shakspere also 
 wrote the following poems, which, though inferior to his 
 dramatic performances, yet have they numerous beauties. 
 They are : — I. Venus and Adonis, dedicated to his great 
 patron the Earl of Southampton, and printed 1602. This 
 poem has been very much admired, and there are a great 
 many very good and incomparable lines in it. II. Tarquin 
 and Lucrece, printed 1594. This piece is not so well done 
 as the former one, but it has some admirable lines, such 
 as the following. . . . III. Mars and Venus. In this 
 poem is described Vulcan's net, and his securing Mars 
 and Venus. . . . IV. The Amorous Epi-<tle of Paris to 
 Helen. 1 V. Helen to Paris. VI. The Tale of Cephalus and 
 Procrisr VII. Achilles' Concealment, of hi* Sex in fh<- 
 Court of Lycomedes. VIII. A Lover's Complaint. IX. Tin 
 Passionate Shep>herd. X. Cupid's Treacher//, and several 
 other miscellaneous poems, particularly on the subject of 
 love." 
 
 1664. In General Prologue to her Playes, Lady Margaret 
 Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle, says : — 
 
 " As for Ben Jon son's brain, it was so strong 
 
 He could conceive or judge what's right, what's wrong; 
 His language plain, significant and free, 
 And in the English tongue the Masterie ; 
 Yet gentle Shakespeare had a fluent wit, 
 Although less learning, yet full well he writ ; 
 
 1 Heywood's. - Edwarde's.
 
 iy6 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 For all his Playes were writ by Nature's light, 
 
 Which gives his Readers and Spectators sight. 
 
 But noble readers, do not think my Playes 
 
 Are such as have been writ in former daies, 
 
 As Jonson, Shakespeare, Beaumont, Fletcher writ, 
 
 .Mine want their Learning, Beading, Language, Wit." 
 
 1664. Sociable letter by tbe same, ccxi. cxxiii. clxix. : — 
 "1 wonder how that person you mention in your letter 
 could either have the conscience or confidence to dispraise 
 Shakespear's playes as to saye they were made up only 
 with clownes, fools, watchmen and the like ; but to 
 answer that person, though Shakespear's wit will answer 
 for himself, I say that it seemes by his judging or censur- 
 ing, he understands not playes or wit ; for to express pro- 
 perly, rightly, visually and naturally a clown's or fool's 
 humour, expressions, phrases, garbs, manners, actions, 
 words and course of life, is as witty, wise, judicious, inge- 
 nious and observing, as to write and express the expressions, 
 phrases, garbs, manners, actions, words, and course of life, 
 of kings and princes. . . . Shakespear did not want wit to 
 express to the life all sorts of persons, of what quality, pro- 
 fession, degree, breeding or birth soever ; nor did he want 
 wit to express the divers and different humours or natures 
 or several passions in mankind ; and so well he hath ex- 
 pressed in his playes all sorts of persons as one would think 
 he had been transformed into every one of those persons 
 he hath described ; and as sometimes one would think he 
 was really himself the clown or jester he feigns, so one 
 would think he was also the king and privy counsellor," 
 &c, and much more." This letter is interesting as leading 
 up to Dryden. 
 
 With the new folio edition, and with this dawn of inci- 
 pient criticism, the centenary of the birth of the great dra- 
 matist was reached. 
 
 While we survey such an extraordinary assemblage of 
 certificates, which speak of William Shakspere's clear and
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 177 
 
 incontestable title to the works which have always been 
 taken by the world to be his, we feel that the authenticity 
 of no other poet could be supported by so many or so power- 
 ful public allusions within a period through which he 
 might have lived. It is a singular consensus of opinion on 
 the part of intelligent and educated persons, many of whom 
 were contemporaries, and to some of whom the poet was as 
 perfectly well known as Tennyson or Browning is to the 
 present age. The attestations are clear and definite. They 
 all tell one story. 
 
 The critical period began with Dryden. 
 
 There is one psychological fact deserving notice here. 
 The love of novelty inherent in human nature makes us 
 charmed by the new and the contemporary. Things that 
 grow old as we grow old fade in charm and interest ; but 
 there is a time when the commonplace and stale passes 
 away from the old, and it becomes invested with a new 
 charm of romance and historical interest. Because it is 
 farther away from us, it becomes more purely' objective. 
 Hence the warm contemporary admiration of Shakspere 
 partially ceased, and he suffered, with other meaner things, 
 from the changes of fashion and of thought. But at the 
 time of his centenary he appears in a new aspect, adjusted 
 by the powers of perspective into his true proportion 
 among his fellows in the distance. It is judgment rather 
 than feeling that is now exercised upon his works ; more 
 centuries must elapse before feeling comes once more 
 justly into play. 
 
 Essay on Dramatic Poesie. 
 
 John Dryden, 1688. "To begin then Avith Shakespeare : 
 he was the man who, of all modern, and perhaps ancient 
 poets, had the lai'gcst and most comprehensive soul. All 
 the images of Nature were still present to him, and he drew 
 them not laboriously, but luckily. When he describes any- 
 thing, you more than see it, you feel it too. Those who
 
 178 THE BACOX-SHAKSPERE QUESTIOX. 
 
 accuse him to have wanted learning give him the greater 
 commendation ; he was naturally learned ; he needed not 
 the spectacles of books to read Nature; he looked inwards 
 and found her there. I cannot say he is everywhere alike ; 
 were he so, I should do him injury to compare him with the 
 greatest of mankind. He is many times flat, insipid ; his 
 comick wit degenerating into clenches, his serious swelling 
 into bombast. But he is always great when some great 
 occasion is presented to him : no man can say he ever had 
 a fit subject for his wit, and did not then l'aise himself as 
 high above the rest of the poets. ' Quantum lenta solent, 
 inter viberna cupressi.' " Yet one may criticise without 
 understanding a poet, without even being able to under- 
 stand him, Davenant had introduced a new style of heroic 
 plays; Dryden established them, and among their efforts 
 were corrections and alterations of Shakspere's plays. 
 
 Dryden says in his Prologue to Secret Love, or The Maiden, 
 Queen ; — 
 
 i. 
 He who writ this, not without pains and thought, 
 From French and English theatres has brought 
 The exactest rules by which a play is wrought. 
 
 II. 
 
 The unities of action, place, and time, 
 The scenes unbroken, and a mingled chime 
 Of Johnson's humour with Corneille's rhyme. 
 
 Villiers satirises Dryden, and this in his Rehearsal, " to 
 ridicule these rhyming mouthing plays" (1672), meaning 
 Dryden in Bayes, who " transverses and transproses," i.e. if 
 he finds a good book in prose, turns it into verse, if in verse, 
 turns it into prose, and calls it his own. He also has a 
 table-book. Bayes : " I come into a coffee-house, or some 
 other place where wittie men resort. I make, as if I minded 
 nothing (do you mark ?), but as soon as any one speaks, pop 
 I slap it down, and make it my own." Bayes : " Why, sir, 
 when I have anything to invent, I never trouble my head 
 about it, but presently turn o'er this book, and there I have
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 179 
 
 at one view all that Perseus, Montaigne, Seneca's tragedies, 
 Horace, Juvenal, Claudian, Pliny, Plutarch's lives, and the 
 rest, have ever thought upon this subject, and so in a trice, 
 by leaving out a few words, or putting in others of my own, 
 the business is done." 
 
 The traditional period begun with Aubrey, in 16S0, 
 after criticism had shown that he was worthy of having 
 had traditions. 1 But he was easily imposed upon, and 
 his demands often caused a manufactured supply. Even 
 Aubrey's "traditions," however, support the chief facts 
 to be proved. "This William, being inclined naturally 
 to poetry and acting, came to London, I guess about 
 eighteen years of age ; and was an actor at one of the 
 playhouses, and did act exceedingly well. Now Ben Jonson 
 was never a good actor, but an excellent instructor. He 
 began early to make essaies at drarnatkpie poetry, which 
 
 1 Most of the "traditions" arise from him, though a few had arisen 
 earlier through personal idiosyncrasies, as the Davenant scandal — see 
 Halliwell's Life of Shakespeare. Though John Aubrey had a good 
 education and intellectual tastes, he was credulous and inexact to an 
 extraordinary degree. Malone said he was a dupe to every gossip. 
 Perhaps a list of his other works best give the qualities of his 
 mind : — 
 
 Vol. I. Miscellanies ; Day-Fatality ; Local-Fatality ; Ostenta ; 
 Omens ; Dreams ; Apparitions ; Voices ; Impulses ; Knockings ; 
 Blows Invisible ; Prophecies; Marvels; Magic ; Transportation in the 
 Air ; Visions in a Beril or Glass ; Converse with Angels and Spirits ; 
 Corps-Candles in Wales ; Oracles ; Exstacy ; Glances of Love ; Envy ; 
 Second-sighted Persons. 
 
 II. A Perambulation of the County of Surrey. 
 
 III. I. The Natural History of Wiltshire. 
 
 2. Architectonica Sacra. 
 
 3. An Apparatus for the Lives of our English and other 
 
 Mathematical Writers. 
 
 4. An Interpretation of Villare Anglicanum. 
 
 5. The Life of Thomas Hobbes of Muhnesbury (his friend). 
 
 6. An lil' a .it Education of Young Gentlemen. 
 
 7. Designatio de Easton Piers in Com. Wilts, per me (eheu) 
 
 infortunatum Johannem Aubrey, R. S. Socium. 
 
 II
 
 1S0 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 at that time was very lowe, and his playes took well. He 
 was a handsome, well- shaped man, and very good company, 
 and of a very ready and pleasant smooth witt." 
 
 Several other " traditions " came into existence in 1 748 ; 
 and another fresh supply arose in connection with the 
 Ireland forgeries in 1796. 
 
 We may then say that the observational period lasted 
 for a century from the date of his birth ; the critical period 
 began in 1668 with Dryclen ; the traditional period with 
 Aubrey in 1680 ; the elaborative period in our own cen- 
 tury; the sceptical outburst in our own decade, i.e., since 
 1850. We have only here dealt with facts and contem- 
 porary witnesses. 
 
 We find that Warwickshire and Stratford were considered 
 honoured for being the birthplace of Shakspere ; that he 
 had come to town to seek his fortune, and laboured faith- 
 fully and patiently in doing so : was handsome and gifted, 
 welcomed and loved by the actors ; adored by the people, 
 received by the nobles, and honoured by both sovereigns; 1 
 jealously spoken of only by Greene, whose opinion was 
 worth nothing, by Ben Jonson in his first acquaintance, 
 who nobly made up for it, and perliaps by the jealous author 
 of Ratseijs Ghost ; and the sum total of their blame was, 
 that he had acted the works of others, altered them, im- 
 proved on them, rivalled them, eclipsed them ; economised 
 in a reckless age, and retired rich. At that time of savage 
 attacks and gross raillery, no other word was ever said 
 against Shakspere, whose life must have been open to the 
 Argus-eyed scrutiny of many rivals. Beyond rancour and 
 above reply, he was called " gentle," " honey-tongued," 
 " friendly," " silver-tongued," " noble," " rare," "having no 
 rayling, but a rayning wit." There would be nothing 
 
 1 It is said (1709 edition of his plays) that a letter was written in 
 his own hand by James I. to Shakspere, and was in the possession of 
 Sir William Davenant till his death, "as many credible persons now 
 living can testify."
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 1N1 
 
 peculiar in considering so dominant a personality capable 
 of writing poems, had he not been proved to have done so. 
 His wit and conversation made him reign in his own circles ; 
 his acting powers were great; his literary powers unpa- 
 ralleled. Had this great cheat been perpetrated, Ben Jonson 
 must have known. Upon what principle could we explain 
 his panegyric to the beloved "departed sweetSwan of Avon," 
 if applied to the " living Lord Keeper of York House, 
 Strand " 1 Had the Baconians demanded the honour for 
 Anthony Bacon, it would not have been so utterly incon- 
 gruous ; for he was dead, yet at the same time obviously a 
 man whose life had not shown the fruits of wit possible to 
 it. Had they demanded it for Raleigh, with any show of 
 authority, it might have been believed, for he was a poet. 
 Had they claimed it for Beaumont or Fletcher, or any one 
 of the other drama writers, there might have seemed some 
 probability in it ; for an actor must have written the plays. 
 
 We have to consider further the 'psychological improba- 
 bility that so many men must have been in the secret, if 
 secret there was; and that all should have been able to 
 keep it, not only to keep it even in silence, but to go out 
 of their way to falsify the facts. We hold that truth is 
 more natural to men than untruth ; and that a truth 
 depending upon a simple definite fact of yes or no, would 
 have been sure to have leaked out through some of the 
 many confederates necessary to so great and complex a plot 
 as this must necessarily have been, had it been. 
 
 Therefore silence is to be held a proof, and not a light 
 one, against the claim for Bacon. 
 
 There are no contemporary or early suggestions of Bacon s 
 authorship of poems, other than those he claimed. 
 
 There are many notices, however, of his high position in 
 
 oratory and in prose writing, of which the most telling is 
 
 in Ben Jonson's "Timber or Discoveries," because there 
 
 he has carefully classified away the poets illustrated by 
 
 William Shakespeare ; before describing orators that were
 
 i82 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 also writers, such as Cicero. He gives Viscount St. Albans 
 as the illustrative man. The mere repetition of the phrase 
 of " insolent Greece and haughty Rome " is a phrase used 
 for mere rhetorical effect in both places; "filled up all 
 numbers" here has only to do with "eloquentia," as any 
 careful student of the following may see. 
 
 Ben says, speaking of De Claris Oratoribus: "I have 
 known many excellent men that would speak suddenly, to 
 the admiration of their hearers, who, upon study and pre- 
 meditation, have been forsaken by their own wits, and no 
 way answered their fame ; their elocmence was greater 
 than their reading, and the things they uttered better than 
 those they knew ; their fortune deserved better of them 
 than their care. For men of present spirits and of greater 
 wits than study do please more in the things they invent 
 than in those they bring. And I have heard some of them 
 compelled to speak, out of necessity, that have so infinitely 
 exceeded themselves, as it was better both for them and 
 their auditory that they were so surprised, not prepared. 
 Nor was it safe then to cross them, for their adversary, 
 their anger, made them more eloquent. Yet these men I 
 could not but love and admire, that they returned to their 
 studies. They left not diligence (as many do) when their 
 rashness prospered ; for diligence is a great aid, even to 
 an indifferent wit ; when we are not contented with the 
 examples of our own age, but would know the face of the 
 former. Indeed, the more we confer with, the more we 
 profit, if the persons be chosen. 
 
 " Dominus Verulamius. — One, though he be excellent and 
 the chief, is not to be imitated alone : for no imitator ever 
 grew up to his author ; likeness is always on this side 
 truth. Yet there happened in my time one noble speaker, 
 who was full of gravity in his speaking. His language 
 (when he could spare or pass by a jest) was nobly censo- 
 rious. No man ever spake more neatly, more pressly, 
 more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in
 
 EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 183 
 
 -what he uttered. No member of his speech but consisted 
 of his own graces. His hearers could not cough or look 
 aside from him without loss. He commanded where he 
 spoke, and had his judges angry and pleased at his devo- 
 tion. No man had their affections more in his power. 
 The fear of every man that heard him was lest he should 
 make an end. 
 
 " Scriptorum Catalogus. — Cicero is said to be the only wit 
 that the people of Rome had, equalled to their empire. We 
 have had many. . . . Lord Egerton, the Chancellor, a grave 
 and great orator, and best when he was provoked. But 
 his learned and able (though unfortunate) successor is he 
 who hath filled up all numbers, and performed that in our 
 tongue which may be compared or preferred either to inso- 
 lent Greece or haughty Eome. In short, within his view 
 and about his times were all the wits born that could 
 honour a language or help study. Now things daily fall, 
 wits grow downward and eloquence gx-ows backwards, so 
 that he may be named, and stand as the mark and ux/j,?} 
 of our language. 
 
 ' ' De Augmentis Scientiarwn, Julius Caesar. Lord St. Alban : 
 
 I have ever observed it to have been the office of a wise 
 
 patriot among the greatest affairs of state to take care of 
 
 the commonwealth of learning. For schools they are the 
 
 seminaries of state, and nothing is worthier the study of a 
 
 statesman than that part of the republic which we call the 
 
 advancement of letters. Witness the care of Julius Csesar, 
 
 who, in the heat of the civil war, writ his books of analogy, 
 
 and dedicated them to Tully. This made the late Lord St. 
 
 Alban entitle his work Novum Organum, which, though by 
 
 the most of superficial men, who cannot get beyond the 
 
 title of nominals, it is not penetrated nor understood, it 
 
 really openeth all defects of learning whatsoever, and is a 
 
 book — 
 
 ' Qui longum noto scriptori proroget revuni.' " ' 
 
 1 Horat. de Art. Poetica.
 
 1 84 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Edmund Bolton's Hypercritica, reprinted in Hazlewood's 
 Essays upon English Poets, 1815. Printed by Hall, 1722. 
 
 " Prime gardens for gathering English according to the 
 true Gage or Standard of the tongue about 15 or 16 years 
 ago." ..." Most of all, there are Sir Francis Bacon's 
 writings, which have the freshest and most savory form 
 and aptest utterances, that (as I suppose) our tongue can 
 hear. These, next to his Majesties' own most Royal Style, 
 are the principal prose writers, whom out of my present 
 memory, I dare commend for the best garden-plots out of 
 which to gather English Language. 
 
 " In verse there are Ed. Spenser's Hymns. I cannot 
 advise the allowance of other his poems, as for practick 
 English, no more than I can do Jeff Chaucer, Lydgate, 
 Pierce Ploughman, or Laureat Skelton." 
 
 Then he goes on to treat poets of the modern style, see 
 ante, under date 16 10. 
 
 If, therefore, his contemporaries did not even claim him 
 to be a poet on the strength of the verses he acknow- 
 ledged, none need claim him as the poet of poems he never 
 owned. 
 
 Beading has only increased my conviction, not only that 
 Bacon did not write the plays, but that he could not, and 
 his editor Spedding thought the same.
 
 ( i8 5 ) 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE HISTORY OF THE HERESY. 
 
 I have presupposed hitherto that those who read this book 
 must have understood the various doctrines of the heresy, 
 and the history thereof. In case, however, that some may 
 be ignorant of the bases of the various assaults, I shall go 
 through a few of the chief statements. Since they have 
 gained form various people have claimed priority. 
 
 Farmer, in 1789, was the first real anti-Shaksperean ; 
 and Horace Walpole's Historic Doubts have been ranked 
 in the list. But this present contest was really first 
 broached in The Romance of Yachting, a novel written in 
 1848 by Hart, New York. 
 
 In August 7, 1S52, in Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, Mr. 
 Jamieson wrote the anonymous article, " Who wrote Shake- 
 speare 1 " and suggested that he " kept a poet," : 
 
 Miss Delia Bacon's article on the Philosophy of Shake- 
 speare's Plan* Unfolded appeared in Putnam'* Magazine for 
 January 1S56, and was afterwards reprinted. She held 
 that the poet Shakspere kept was " Bacon," and that he 
 had used these plays to unfold his new philosophy. She 
 
 1 "Who wrote Shakespeare?" — Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, 
 Saturday, August 7, 1S52. "Thus asks .Mrs. Kitty in High Life /'< 
 Stairs ; to which his Grace, my lord Duke, gravely replies, ' 1' n Jon- 
 son.' 'Oh, no,' quoth my Lady Bab; 'Shakespeare was written by 
 one Mr. Finis, for I saw his nam" at the end of t l . Though 
 
 the author of this article laughs at these errors, he goes hastily 
 through the subject, suggesting that Shakspere kept a poet ; that whi n 
 the poet died, the plays ceaa ar ; but Shakspere, as man; 
 
 retired rich.
 
 
 iS6 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION 
 
 was nevertheless so inconsistent as to dwell over every 
 souvenir of Shakspere ; to haunt the places where he had 
 lived ; to spend even a night in Stratford Church by his 
 tomb ; and to lose her reason in her perplexity. But she 
 suggested the idea in America, where many subsequent 
 writers took it up. Meanwhile in England Mr. William 
 Henry Smith was working at it, and in 1857 ne pub- 
 lished his book Bacon and Shakespeare, an Inquiry touching 
 Players, Playhouses, and Playwriters in the days of Eliza- 
 (" Ih. This was said to have convinced Lord Palmerston. 
 
 Mr. William D. O'Connor, in a novel entitled Harring- 
 ton, a Story of True Love, published in Boston, U.S., gave 
 his strong support to Miss Delia Bacon's views, i860. 
 
 The Hon. Nathaniel Holmes, called by Mr. Wyman, the 
 bibliographer, "the apostle of Baconianism," in 1866 wrote 
 a substantial book to prove that Bacon wrote the plays, 
 and that he was known to be the author by some of his 
 contemporaries. His Authorship of Shakespeare, written in 
 two volumes, has reached the third edition. This is really 
 the text-book of the Baconians proper, and gives all their 
 strong " points." It sifts out a chronological order of pro- 
 duction of the plays, and of the several writings of Bacon, 
 and shows there can be no possibility of borrowing ; and 
 that the parallel or identical passages are incontestable 
 proofs of Bacon's authorship, especially those in science and 
 philosophy. 
 
 It represents much good work with a mistaken idea. It 
 is much the best book on that side, and is certainly inte- 
 resting to read as a psj'chological development. 
 
 The Australians next became interested in the question ; 
 and Dr. William Thompson of Melbourne in 1878 wrote a 
 pamphlet entitled The Political Purpose of the Renascence 
 Drama: Tlie Key of the Argument ; another in 1880, Our 
 Renascence Drama, or History made Visible; in 1881 he 
 added a continuation, William Shakespeare in Romance and 
 Reality ; in the same year Bacon and Shakespeare ; and
 
 THE HISTORY OF THE HERESY. 187 
 
 another pamphlet, Baron, not Shakespeare, on Vivisection. 
 In 1882 he published still another pamphlet, The Political 
 Allegories in the Renascence Drama of Francis Bacon. In 
 1S83 appeared A Minute among the Amenities, which he 
 puts forth as answer to some Shaksperean critics, whom 
 he thought had been severe on him. 
 
 Dr. Thompson, in Bacon and Shakespeare on Vivisection, 
 says that Bacon was a vivisector ; that Harvey caught 
 his idea from him ; and that the medicine in the plays 
 agrees with Bacon's views; and that the examination of 
 the murderers of Sir Thomas Overbury had taught Bacon 
 the powers of poison, as shown in Hamlet and King Lear. 
 He also in The Renascence Drama says that the division 
 into five acts and many scenes was an alteration in the 
 plays; that they were all originally written in trilogy, as 
 may be seen by intelligent comparison ; that W. II. of the 
 sonnets is William Herbert, afterwards Earl of Pembroke, 
 who supported Bacon twenty years after against the bitter 
 attacks of Southampton in the House of Lords. There is 
 no authority for Shakspere knowing Chapman, though 
 Troilus and Cressida is taken from his Homer. 
 
 " Camden l never mentioned Shakespeare in his Annals ; 
 neither did Bacon." But Camden did mention Shakespeare. 
 Bacon also forgot to mention Ben Jonson, Beaumont, 
 Fletcher, and many others. 
 
 Meanwhile many short articles appeared on either side ; 
 but in his Shakespearean Myth, 1881, Mr. Appleton Morgan 
 slightly varied the ground. He says in it that there are 
 three Anti-Shakespearean Theories : — 
 
 1. The Delia Bacon, or Junta Theory. 
 
 2. The Baconian or Unitary Theory. 
 
 3. The New Theory. 
 
 It is a little difficult at first to grasp the distinction 
 of the New Theory. lie says that " experts have proved 
 that the style of Bacon and Shakespeare are as far apart 
 
 1 See Chap. iv.
 
 iSS THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 as the poles. Yet that internal evidence preponderates 
 in favour of the Baconians. The New Theory is, that 
 all the learned parts are by a learned hand, but that 
 Shakespeare put in all the clown business. The New 
 Theory and the Delia Bacon Theory agree in this, that 
 William Shakespeare was fortunate in the manuscripts 
 brought to him, and grew rich in making plays out of 
 them. A modern manager does the same. Our grati- 
 tude is due to W. Shakespeare as editoi', though not as 
 author of the plays. The plays could not have been 
 popular then ; therefore his own plays were of a different 
 and popular class, but his name was at every one's 
 service, and his own real plays are apparently lost. 
 Among all the stage managers, only one, William Shake- 
 speare, Avas able to retire as a landed gentleman, and pur- 
 chase an Esquire." Mr. Morgan has forgotten Alleyn, 
 and the property Burbage at one time owned, and that 
 without the help of writing plays. " Bacon was daily 
 writing under other names, and much of his handwriting is 
 preserved. None of Shakespeare's is left. The ' un blotted ' 
 copies could only have been the stage parts. The literature 
 of the country had, up to the date of their appearance, 
 failed to furnish, and has been utterly powerless since to 
 produce, any type, likeness, or formative l trace of them. 
 The history for a century on either side of their era dis- 
 closes no resources upon which levy could have been made 
 for their creation. The death of the author 2 attracted no 
 contemporary attention, and for many years afterwards 
 the dramas remain unnoticed. Mr. Manager Shakespeare 
 produced them, but nobody cared to know the author. To 
 suppose he icrote the plays, was to suppose a miracle in 
 London. Is a Jack-of-all-trades about a theatre the ideal 
 poet, philosopher, and seer ? There is no record of his plays 
 in his will. Grant that the circulation of the blood was a 
 
 1 See Mr. Symonds' antecedent dramatic literature. 
 
 2 See Chap. v.
 
 THE HISTORY OF THE HERESY. 189 
 
 familiar fact in the days of Shakespeare, that the Mence- 
 chmus of Plautus was translated ; that Iago's speech in 
 Othello and the stanza of Berni's Orlando Innamorato 
 were mere coincidences ; or better still, admit that there 
 was an English version of the poem in Shakespeare's day ; 
 admit if required that the Hamlet of Saxo-Grarumaticus 
 had been translated. 1 The Stationers' Company records 
 bear no trace of any such claimant as William Shakespeare." 
 It is wise occasionally to quote a few passages in extenso. 
 Mr. Morgan is fairer than most anti-Shakespeareans. He 
 does grant that though Hervey's " circulation of the blood 
 was discovered in 1619, published 1628, that Servetus had 
 taught it in 1553 ; Walter Warner spoke of it; Ricardus 
 Columbus and Cisalpinus believed in it many years before 
 Harvey wrote on it." But he does not seem aware that 
 the Mencechmus of Plautus was translated at least before the 
 play of the Comedy of Error*; 2 that the particular idea of 
 Berni's, upon which Iago's speech must have been founded, 
 was rendered in Thomas Wilson's Art of Rhetoric, which 
 Shakspere more than likely studied at school ; that Saxo- 
 Grammaticus 3 was translated not only into Danish but into 
 French, and through that into English ; and that the 
 
 1 See the whole of Chap. v. 
 
 2 June 10, 1594, Thomas Creede entered for his "booke entituled 
 Menaechnii, beinge a pleasant and fine conceyted Comedye taken out of 
 the most excellent wittie Poet Plautus, chosen purposely from out the 
 rest as being least harmful and most delightful." — The Station- 
 
 /.' 1 inters. 
 
 The Corned)/ of Errors was not played until the end of December 
 same year. 
 
 :t Suxo-(Jranimaticus in the twelfth century wrote the History of 
 Denmark, and in it of Hamblet. Bellforest, a French author, trans- 
 lates the tale, slightly altering it. On an English translation of this 
 romance, called The History of Hamblet, Shakspere based his play. 
 It is in black-letter, printed by Richard Bradocke for Thomas Pavier, 
 1560. Some suppose the modern story satirised modern characters. 
 Burleigh, as old Polonius, gave his son similar advice before he set out 
 on his travels in 1598. Sir Philip Sydney supposed to be the real 
 Hamlet.
 
 190 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Stationers' Company records do bear several traces of 
 William Shakspere as a claimant at his own date. 
 
 This shows that reasoning upon negatives is not so strong 
 as on affirmatives, as it leaves more room for changing 
 views with extending knowledge. 
 
 He says further that " Gravitation is mentioned in 
 Troilus and Cressida, though Newton's book came out in 
 1642, and that in Hamlet the philosophy of Giordano 
 Bruno (then Professor of Philosophy in Wittemberg) was 
 taught." But Mr. Morgan forgets that Giordano Bruno 
 was in Oxford, 1583-86, publicly lecturing against Ari- 
 stotle and in support of the Copernican theory of tho 
 earth, which Bacon disbelieved. 
 
 He asserts that there is " no proof that Shakespeare knew 
 Southampton ; " yet further on he quotes a letter from 
 Roland White to Sir Robert Sydney, October 11, 1599, say- 
 ing, " My Lord Southampton and Lord Rutland come not 
 to the Court, the one but very seldom ; they pass away the 
 time merely in going to plays every day ; " therefore South- 
 ampton must, at least, have known Shakspere from afar 
 on one side ; as the dedications show, Shakspere must have 
 known Southampton to a certain degree on the other. 
 He also reminds us that Wotton, in a letter to Bacon, says 
 that " the burning of the Globe destroyed only a little wood 
 and straw, and a few forsaken cloaks." This, opposed to 
 De Witt's evidence, makes one suspicious of Wotton, whose 
 authority has more than once been proved insufficient. 
 " The gaining arms to Shakespeare involved venality and 
 falsehood in father, son, and two kings-at-arms, and did not 
 escape protest." * If this were true, it would not be to the 
 point; but it is not true, and three kings-at-arms would 
 have been involved. 
 
 He repeats again, " The New Theory, that various noble- 
 men wrote these plays, and that they used Shakespeare's 
 name as a nom de plume, and that the printed plays are 
 1 See Appendix, Note 9.
 
 THE HISTORY OF THE HERESY. 191 
 
 totally different from those acted and popular as his. 
 Hemings and Condell only selected 25 out of the 42 plays 
 credited to Shakespeare in life, and added nine never be/ore 
 heard of." "The Shakespeareans take Jonson's verses, but 
 are marvellously afraid to take his prose. Ben does not 
 put Shakespeare among the wits, but among his personal 
 acquaintance. Yet on Jonson's 1 uncorroborated lines they 
 build his fame. Bacon, Raleigh, Matthew never heard of 
 Shakespeare, or would have spoken of him." As Morgan 
 does not confess to be a Baconian, it may be hoped that 
 further reading may induce him to return to the " faith of 
 his fathers." 
 
 In 1883 Mrs. Pott published a large volume called 
 Bacon's Promus of Formularies and Elegancies, which she 
 edited with voluminous notes, and parallel passages from 
 various authors of the period, chiefly Shakspere, assert- 
 ing that Bacon wrote his plays at least, if not those of 
 several other dramatists. 
 
 The Promus had been noticed and condensed in Spedding's 
 edition of Bacon's Life and Works, but Mrs. Pott thought 
 it worthy of being printed in extenso, as a specimen of 
 Bacon's literary workshop. It commences in 1594, and 
 goes on for two or three years. 
 
 I do not think it proves much. The quotations were 
 evidently not original ; indeed most of them can be traced 
 to older dates ; and those that cannot, probably arose from 
 remembrance of conversations. 
 
 In 1884 Mrs. Pott published a pamphlet called Thirty- 
 two Reasons for Believing that Bacon wrote Shakespeare. 
 As these contain the " reasons " of Judge Holmes and 
 other Baconians in a condensed form, I treat them here 
 as illustrating the general question. 
 
 I condense her statements : — 
 
 1. "That nothing in his life makes it impossible for 
 Bacon to have written the plays." 
 
 1 See Chapter v.
 
 192 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION, 
 
 ii. " That chronological order, dates, and other parti- 
 culars coincide with facts in the life of Bacon." 
 
 in. " The hints given by the author's experiences appli- 
 cable to Bacon and not to Shakspere." 
 
 iv. " That Bacon was a poet." 
 
 v. " That Bacon was addicted to the theatre, got up 
 masques, and wrote The Conference of Pleasure, The Gesta 
 Graijorum, Masque of an Indian Prince." No person who 
 could write the plays would have written these ; but I have 
 already said much on this point in the general question. 
 
 vi. " The Earls of Southampton and Pembroke are not 
 shown to have any intimacy with Shakspere, but they had 
 with Bacon." The " dedications " would have been all the 
 more impossible to Bacon had they been written to an inti- 
 mate. 
 
 The Baconians make so much use of tradition, that they 
 also should remember the very persistent one that South- 
 ampton gave Shakspere the money to buy New Place as a 
 present from himself for dedicating his poems to him. 
 
 vn. " Many of the wits and poets acknowledged Bacon 
 their chief. For example — 
 
 The Great Assises of Parnassus." We have shown in 
 Chap. v. how entirely the interior of this pamphlet, of 
 which the title-page is quoted here, supports Shakspere in 
 his true position as actor and dramatic poet, and leaves 
 Bacon merely as scientist and Lord Chancellor. 
 
 VIII. " That Ben Jonson used the same words in address- 
 ing both." Only one similar phrase, and I show elsewhere 
 how that might arise. " Ben Jonson does not put Shak- 
 spere among the sixteen greatest wits of the day." That 
 has been accounted for. " Sir Henry Wotton does not 
 mention him at all." As, however, he also omitted Spenser 
 and other great poets, this is not so surprising. 
 
 ix. "That in the time of Bacon's poverty, 1623, Ben 
 Jonson tried to push the sale of Shakspere's works." The 
 conclusion desired does not follow. These wei-e printed by
 
 THE HISTORY OF THE HERESY. 193 
 
 Isaac Jaggard and Edward Blount, at the charges of W. 
 Jaggard, Ed. Blount, J. Smithweeke, and W. Apsley, and 
 all profits were shared by these, with probably a commission 
 to Ben Jonson, and no share to Bacon. 
 
 x. "That Bacon had some connexion with Shakspere." 
 This is, however, only shown by the same clerk scribbling 
 their names on the same sheet of paper in the Northumber- 
 land MS., explained in Chap. iv. 
 
 xi. " That he uses ' the alphabet,' " and that this means 
 a secret cipher, whereas it really means the " Alphabet of 
 the Sciences." See Chap, vii., and Spedding's Bacon. 
 
 xii. " That Sir Toby Matthew's letter from abroad adds : 
 P.aS'. — The most prodigious wit that ever I knew of my 
 nation on this side of the sea is of your Lordship's name, 
 though he be known by another." This of course refers to 
 his brother, Anthony Bacon ; when on his secret-service 
 missions abroad he used an alias. " This side of the sea " 
 excludes the possibility of his meaning Francis Bacon, as 
 Matthew did not meet him there, when in his extreme 
 youth he was abroad. "That Bacon speaks of his inven- 
 tions, meaning poems." " Invention " he repeatedly uses 
 as the application of imagination to experiment so as to 
 make discoveries. 
 
 xiii. " That he called himself a ' concealed poet ' to Sir 
 John Davies." ' Unless it implied that Bacon had written 
 Davies' Nosce Teipsum for him, how was Davies to know 
 what he meant 1 If Bacon wrote Shakspere's plays and 
 spoke of it, he would not be a ' concealed poet.' It really 
 however refers to his parabolical writings. See his deuni- 
 tions of poetry referred to in ( Jhapter iv. 
 
 xiv. and xv. "The knowledge in the plays is that of 
 Bacon, as, for instance, in Law and Classics," Arc. As 
 Shakspere had a cousin and many friends lawyers ; as he 
 lived near the law court.-, frequenting the same taverns; 
 as his hither had been in an office that required some legal 
 
 1 Sec Appendix, Note 15.
 
 194 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 knowledge ; as all people of the period seemed to go through 
 numerous petty litigations ; and as most dramatic writers 
 of the time used law phrases freely, it is not unnatural 
 Shakspere should have done so. Shakspere for his classical 
 stories used the translations then so abundant — North's 
 rendering of Plutarch's Lives, published by Vautrollier ; 
 translations of Ovid and Cicero by the same ; Diana of 
 Montcmayor, translated by Thomas Wilson ; Tlie Menaichmi 
 of Plautus, translated earlier, and published in 1595 ; Mon- 
 taigne's Essays, translated by Florio ; Baudwin's Collection 
 of the Sayings of all the Wise, 1547. Then there were 
 Lilly's Euphues, Sidney's Arcadia, Greene's plays and novels, 
 with those of Marlowe and others ; histories, travels, essays, 
 probably Bacon's among the number. 
 
 " Shakspere's library," or the books he has referred to, 
 has been collected by Collier and Hazlitt. But Bacon's 
 knowledge is much more extensive and thorough than that 
 of the plays, and of a different nature. 
 
 The general science of the plays comes not from Bacon's 
 mind. The flowers of Shakspere are those naturally ob- 
 served by a poet born amid rich woodland and river 
 scenery, and transported to the suburbs of a large city, 
 where woods were still within walking distance, and where 
 some plants not very common were found by Gerard in 
 the very theatre-field. (See Gerard's Historie of Plan Is, 
 
 I597-) 
 
 xvi. "That the subjects which engross them are the 
 
 same." 
 
 xvii. "That the observations on character are the same." 
 
 xviii. "That the scientific errors are the same." That 
 is very natural, and depends on the advancement of the 
 times ; the scientific knowledge, however, is different both 
 in kind and in degree. 
 
 xix. " Bacon's studies of any time introduced into plays 
 of the same date ; " and 
 
 xx. " In several editions of a play, Bacon's increased
 
 HISTORY OF THE HERESY. 195 
 
 knowledge shown in the later editions." There are different 
 means of accounting for the element of truth that lies in 
 these ; as well as in the fact that 
 
 xxi. " The vocabulary is very much the same." 
 
 xxiii. " Baconian ideas and groups of ideas appear in 
 the plays." I have shown elsewhere, however, that Bacon, 
 no less than Shakspere, read much and borrowed much. 
 
 xxiv. "Mrs. Cowden Clarke's ninety-five points of Shak- 
 spere's style common to Bacon." 
 
 xxv. " Shakspere grammar of Dr. Abbott serves for 
 Bacon." 
 
 xxvi. "Figures of speech frequently the same." 
 
 xxvii. " The Promus notes do not appear in Bacon's 
 works, but in Shakspere's plays." Yery probably they 
 were taken from them, or from common sources. None of 
 them were original ; but we see that many of the proverbs 
 and headings do appear in Bacon's works and not in Shak- 
 spere's : for instance, phrases regarding wine. 
 
 xxviit. " Superstitious and religious belief the same." 
 
 xxix. " Bacon's favourite authors Shakspere's also." But 
 we must remember Bacon's age was nearly the same as 
 Shakspere's, his period, his place of residence, his public, 
 his sovereign, some of his friends, and many of his circum- 
 stances. Is there no resemblance between other two writers 
 in the same period, or of Dryden's period, or Wordsworth's 
 period of a similar nature 1 
 
 xxx. " Striking omissions from the plays fit the character 
 and circumstances of Bacon. No village experiences, no 
 brewing, cider-making, or baking." AVe have shown that 
 just in these points Bacon was more interested than Shak- 
 spere, and more likely to mention them. 
 
 " No children are mentioned, therefore the childless 
 Bacon wrote them." I think Mrs. Pott trips here. Mac- 
 duff's feeling for his children could only be portrayed by 
 a father. Constance and Arthur, and other parents and 
 children appear, and boys are always called " sweet." Hut 
 
 N
 
 196 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 the interests of the times were more centred in plays on 
 adult life, and Shakspere supplied the demand ; and though 
 they enjoyed " children players," these generally performed 
 plays suitable for adults. 
 
 xxxi. "That the folio of 1623 included plays never before 
 heard of." That is to say, it included plays of which the 
 criticism by name has not come down to us in some way or 
 other. But these were very few, only two or three. And 
 they were preserved and collected by the proprietors of the 
 theatre to which he sold them ; who had no interest in pub- 
 lishing the plays beyond their loving desire to "keep the 
 memory of their worthy fellow alive," even at the cost of their 
 copyright. " The folio was published two years after Bacon's 
 fall, when he was trying to publish everything on account 
 of poverty and failing health." But how, without a free 
 confession, could he get his hands into the manuscript chest 
 of the theatre, so as to select and reconstruct and cipher 
 the number he wished printed 1 How did he bribe so many 
 concerned — proprietors, printers, publishers, poets — Ben 
 Jonson in particular — not only to tell such wholesale lies, 
 but to stick to them 1 What profit could come to him, as 
 his proportion of the reprint, done at " the charges" of 
 other men 1 What cause, other than profit or honour, could 
 have tempted him so to spend his failing health in toils 
 that kept him away from the great work of his life ? 
 
 xxxii. " That the difficulties which have to be explained 
 away are much less in the case of Bacon than of Shakspere." 
 I do not agree with this statement, or with any of the 
 above, or I should not have taken the trouble to write these 
 pages ; and I think careful comparison would convince any 
 one that any appearance of truth they have is only super- 
 ficial. 
 
 Mrs. Pott's other pamphlet, published in 1885, Did 
 Francis Bacon write Shakespeare ? treats the same ideas in a 
 different way. But I cannot see how any one could consider 
 them either proofs or reasonings. The first proof brought
 
 HISTORY OF THE HERESY. 197 
 
 forward is, " Bacon's mother was a lady ; Shakspere's 
 mother, of a peasant family." Though this contrast is quite 
 irrelevant to the subject in hand, genius being of a different 
 sphere from social distinction, one cannot accept it. The 
 family of the Ardens was very far above the rank of 
 peasants ; a comfortable well-to-do, well-connected family, 
 farming their own lands, 1 and living in houses very much 
 above the average of the times, having a memory of a 
 higher past, and aspirations towards a higher future, that 
 could not have entered a peasant's brain. It is very evident 
 that Mary Arden was at once possessed of powers and 
 charms. She was her father's favourite daughter, and his 
 executor, and was most probably a methodical help-meet 
 for her ambitious but unpractical husband. She lived long, 
 had a handsome family ; and if we judge by the traces of 
 her in the female characters of the plays, must have been 
 tender, pure, and noble. A happier and more healthy- 
 minded mother was she certainly, in any case, for a great 
 man, than the learned, ambitious, narrow, masterful Lady 
 Bacon, whose mind preyed on itself until it went crazy. 
 
 " It will tax ingenuity to invent any satisfactory explana- 
 tion of the facts that some of Shakspere's plays appeared 
 during his lifetime without his name, and some did not 
 appear till after his death, supposing AYilliam Shakspere 
 to have been the author." The very simple and satisfactory 
 explanation is, that the habits of these days in regard to 
 publication were perfectly different from ours ; that it was 
 perfectly common for writers to publish even their own 
 writings without name or signature, and to do so in some 
 editions and not in others; that Shakspere wrote / /■ the 
 stage, and therefore for the proprietors, and it was not to 
 their interest to publish; and in his later plays, when his 
 name had been famous some time, were more likely to be 
 more jealously guarded than the earlier. But the pirates 
 were always about, and either put on names or no names 
 1 See Appendix, Note 4.
 
 198 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 on the title-page, to suit then* own convenience. Printing 
 and publishing was a difficult business in these days, as we 
 can see in the Stationers' Records. 1 " After his retirement," 
 the Rev. John Ward, Vicar of Stratford-on-Avon, in 1663 
 writes that " Shakspere wrote two plays every year for the 
 stage, for which he was so well paid, he could spend at the 
 rate of a thousand a year ; " and the Rev. J. Ward knew 
 Shakspere's daughter Judith. 
 
 I believe it was a sense that, being removed from the 
 sphere of pure poetry by the mercantile impulse towards 
 them, they fell so far short of his ideas of what they should 
 be, which prevented his caring to publish them. Yet his 
 brain may have been full of plans of correction and publi- 
 cation when he died. Various other queries and difficulties 
 are brought forward, all the important points of which 
 have been answered. The parallelisms only show how well 
 the industry of Shakspere kept him abreast of the litera- 
 ture of the time. But we could not go through each 
 trifling dispute in detail without writing a mighty volume. 
 Our ignorance of many facts is to be deplored ; but re- 
 search daily reduces our ignorance. 
 
 The revolt against authority and custom of our awakened 
 and intelligent period, good to a certain degree, sometimes 
 goes too far. It often deems the reasons it brings stronger 
 than the reasons it finds, merely because of bringing them. 
 It would destroy the carefully guarded, to replace it with 
 new forms, whose only value lies in novelty. It should 
 base itself on Bacon's laws regarding antiquity and novelty, 
 and it would be at once more valuable and more practical. 
 
 Much has been said and proved, contested and disproved, 
 regarding the authorship of the fourth Gospel. This at- 
 tempt at disproving our fifth Gospel is another outcome of 
 the same destructive creed, but I consider that the laws 
 regarding the authenticity of testimony and credibility of 
 witnesses can be fully satisfied in this case, and the attack 
 1 See Appendix, Note 18. 
 
 I
 
 HISTORY OF THE HERESY. 199 
 
 resisted. The Daily Telegraph committed a fallacy in 
 using the question-begging epithet, " Dethroning Shakspere," 
 in the correspondence on this subject, reproduced in book- 
 form. Without doubt, it was an attempt to do so. Success 
 requires greater strength than that. The "attempt and 
 not the deed confounds it." 
 
 Yet some good comes out of all evil. The good for us in 
 this discussion is, that it sends us back from second-hand 
 traditions and repeated errors, forgeries, misstatements, 
 and misconstructions, to read anew the real authors, and 
 their real friends and foes, in the living reality of time and 
 space contemporary with them. The more one reads of 
 them, the less it seems necessary to answer the Baconian 
 statements ; the answers seem so simple and self-evident.
 
 ( 200 ) 
 
 CHAPTER VI L 
 
 bacon's cipher's. 
 
 Bacon sometimes, as in Valerius Terminus, wrote his 
 doctrines in a purposely abrupt and obscure style, such 
 as would "choose its reader." He did not give his philo- 
 sophy in a form which " whoso runs may read," and was 
 scornful of "the general reader." But there is not the 
 slightest ground in his works for believing there was a 
 cipher in them. Nay, rather, he apologised for introducing 
 ciphers as a part of learning at all. His connection with 
 Essex, with his brother Anthony, with so many treason- 
 able and state affairs, must have taught him the value of 
 thoroughly understanding the powers of concealment in 
 writing; 1 and we are not surprised he considers ciphers 
 
 1 In the examination of the Lopez treason, in his report Bacon 
 writes : " It was not so safe to use the mediation of Manuel Louys, who 
 had been made privy to the matter as some base carrier of letters ; 
 which letters should also be written in a cipher, not of alphabet, but 
 of words, such as mought, if they were opened, import no vehement 
 suspicion. . . . These letters were written obscurely (as was touched) 
 in terms of merchandise ; to which obscurity when Ferrera excepted, 
 Lopez answered, they knew his meaning by that which had passed 
 before. . . . Gomez was apprehended at his landing, and about him 
 were found the letters aforesaid, written in jargon or verbal cipher, 
 but yet somewhat suspicious, in these words : ' This bearer will tell 
 you the price in which your pearls are esteemed, and in what resolution 
 we rest about a little musk and amber, which I am determined to buy,' 
 which was confessed to be meant to be deciphered as ' the allowance 
 of pearls,' that they accepted the offer of Lopez to poison the Queen,' 
 and ' the amber and musk ' meant the destruction of the Queen's ships, 
 a longer message than the cipher ! "
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 201 
 
 in his general survey of learning. But he gives them no 
 prominence. 
 
 In the 6th Book of De Aug mentis, Chapter i., Bacon 
 treats of ciphers and the method of deciphering. " Com- 
 munications may either be written by the common alphabet 
 (which is used by everybody), or by a secret or private one 
 agreed upon by particular persons, called ciphers. There 
 are many kinds, simple and mixed, those in two different 
 letters; wheel-ciphers, key-ciphers, word-ciphers, and the 
 like. There may be a double alphabet of significants and 
 non-significants. The three merits of a cipher are : 1st, 
 easy to write ; 2nd, safe, or impossible to be deciphered 
 without the key ; 3rd, such as not to raise suspicion." 
 "Now for this elusion of inquiry there is a new and 
 useful contrivance for it, which, as I have it by me, 
 why should I set it down among the desiderata, in- 
 stead of propounding the thing itself ? It is this — let a 
 man have two alphabets, one of true letters, the other of 
 non-significants, and let him unfold in them two letters at 
 once, the one carrying the secret, the other such a letter 
 as the writer would have been likely to send. Then if 
 any one be strictly examined as to the cipher, let him offer 
 the alphabet of non-significants for the true letters, and 
 the alphabet of true letters for the non-significants. Thus 
 the examiner will fall upon the exterior letter, which, 
 finding probable, he will not suspect anything of another 
 letter written." He then alludes to his own contrivance 
 in his early youth in Paris (which he gives in full), and is 
 the same as that mentioned in Ever// Boy's Book. "But 
 for avoiding suspicion altogether, I will add another con- 
 trivance. The way to do it is thus — first let all the letters 
 of the alphabet be resolved into transpositions of two letters 
 only. For the transposition of two letters through live 
 places will yield 32 differences, much more than 24, which 
 is the number of letters in our alphabet."
 
 202 
 
 THE BACOX-SHAKSPERE QUESTIOX. 
 
 Example of an alphabet in two letters : — 
 
 A 
 
 B 
 
 C 
 
 D 
 
 E 
 
 F 
 
 fin;inn 
 
 aaaab 
 
 aaaba 
 
 aaabb 
 
 aabaa 
 
 aabab 
 
 G 
 
 H 
 
 I 
 
 K 
 
 L 
 
 M 
 
 aabba 
 
 aabbb 
 
 abaaa 
 
 abaab 
 
 ababa 
 
 ababb 
 
 N 
 
 
 
 P 
 
 Q 
 
 E, 
 
 S 
 
 abbaa 
 
 abbab 
 
 abbba 
 
 abbbb 
 
 baaaa 
 
 baaab 
 
 T 
 
 V 
 
 W 
 
 X 
 
 Y 
 
 Z 
 
 baaba 
 
 baabb 
 
 babaa 
 
 babab 
 
 babba 
 
 babbb 
 
 " Nor is it a slight thing which is thus by the way 
 effected. For hence we see how thoughts may be com- 
 municated at any distance of place by means of any objects 
 perceptible either to the eye or ear, provided only those 
 objects are capable of two differences. It was subject to 
 this condition that the infolding writing shall contain five 
 times as many letters as the writing infolded, and no other 
 condition or restriction is implied. 
 
 " When you prepare to write, you must reduce the in- 
 terior epistle to this literal alphabet. Let the interior 
 
 epistle be 
 
 FLY. 
 
 Example of Reduction. 
 
 FLY 
 
 aabab ababa babba 
 
 Have by you at the same time another alphabet in two 
 forms; I mean one in which each of the letters of the 
 common alphabet, both capital and small, is exhibited in 
 two different forms — any forms that you find convenient. 
 Then take your interior epistle, reduced to the biliteral 
 shape, and adapt to it, letter by letter, your exterior epistle 
 in the bi-form character, then write it out. The exterior 
 epistle is ' Do not go till I come.' 
 
 Example op Adaptation. 
 
 F L Y 
 
 aa bab ab aba b a bba 
 
 Do not go till I come. 
 
 " The doctrine of cyphers carries with it another doc-
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 203 
 
 trine, which is its relative. This is the doctrine of de- 
 ciphering, or of detecting ciphers, though one be quite 
 ignorant of the alphabet used or the private understanding 
 between the parties, a thing requiring both labour and 
 ingenuity, and dedicated, as the other likewise is, to the 
 secrets of princes. By skilful precaution indeed it may 
 be made useless, though as things are it is of very great 
 use ; for if good and safe ciphers were introduced, there are 
 very many of them which altogether elude and exclude the 
 decipherer, and yet are sufficiently convenient and ready to 
 read and write. But such is the rawness and unskilfulness of 
 secretaries and clerks in the courts of kings, that the greatest 
 matters are commonly trusted to weak and futile ciphers." 
 In paragraph 202 Bacon speaks of a cipher within a 
 cipher : "You write in a common cipher, with an alphabet 
 of eighteen letters, the cipher being such that the five 
 vowels are used as nulls ; then by the last cipher the five 
 vowels are made significant and give the hidden sense." 
 He seems to speak of this as his own. Mr. Ellis's notes to 
 Spedding's Bacon say: "The earliest writer on ciphers, 
 except Trithemius, whom he quotes, is John Baptist Porta, 
 whose work De Occultis Literarum Notis was reprinted 
 at Strasburg in 1606. The wheel-cipher is described in 
 chapters 7, 8, and 9. The Ciplira Clavis, described by 
 Porta, is a cipher of position. The cipher of words is 
 worked at both by Trithemius and Porta. The Traite des 
 Chiffres, ou secretes manieres d'escrire, par Blaise de Vigenere, 
 Bourbonnais, Paris 1587, brings forward another cipher. 
 The two authors whom he chicllv mentions are Trithemius 
 and Porta. The key-cipher of which Porta speaks he 
 ascribes to a certain Belasio, who employed it as early 
 as 1549, Porta's book not being published until 1563: 
 "Auquel il a insere le chiffre sans faire mention dont il Ie 
 tenoit." Porta's book, he goes on to say, was not "en 
 vente" till 1568. The invention was ascribed to Belasio 
 by the Grand Vicar of St. Peter's at Rome, who was a
 
 20 4 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 great scholar in ciphers. Vigenere gives an account of 
 ciphers in which letters are represented by combinations of 
 other letters, which Porta already had done. But he also 
 gives the biliteral alphabet and the combinations above. 
 The transition from this to Bacon's cipher is so easy, that 
 the credit given to him must materially be reduced. 
 
 The Baconians have been driven to the desperate attempt 
 of seeking and finding a cipher in the plays to prop up 
 their otherwise unsupported conclusions. 
 
 "Tragedy and Comedy are of the same alphabet." Mrs. 
 Pott and other Baconians anxiously taught the existence of 
 one, basing their belief on this phrase that can be read 
 simply enough, if we take it to mean that the same letters 
 and words rearranged differently can tell of woes and 
 death, or mirth and joy. This idea is supported by 
 another sentence written to Sir Toby Matthew (162 1). 
 " Set the alphabet in a frame as you can very well do. 
 My instauration I reserve for our conference; it sleeps 
 not. Those works of the alphabet are, in my opinion, of 
 less use to you where you are now, than at Paris " (Bacon 
 to Matthew, 93rd). Even if this meant something more, 
 it can be explained from the table of the Greek alphabet, 
 under which Bacon classifies all the branches of his learning 
 and works. 
 
 Bacons "Alphabet of Nature." 
 
 Earth . . Greater masses t t t t 67th inquiry. 
 
 Water . . Greater masses v v v v 68th inquiry. 
 
 Air . . Greater masses (f> <f> <p <j> 69th inquiry. 
 
 Fire . . Greater masses X X X X 7 otn inquiry. 
 
 Heavens . Greater masses ip <j> u> u> 71st inquiry. 
 
 Meteors . . Greater masses w w w ui 72nd inquiry. 
 
 Conditions of Beings. 
 
 Existence and non-existence . a a a a 73rd inquiry. 
 
 Possibility and impossibility 
 Much and little 
 Durable and transitory . 
 Natural and unnatural . 
 Natural and artificial 
 
 /3 £ /? /3 74th inquiry. 
 
 7 7 7 7 75th inquiry. 
 
 8 8 8 8 76th inquiry, 
 e e e e 77th inquiry. 
 
 s s s s 78th inquiry, &c.
 
 BACO^ S CIPHERS. 205 
 
 "The rule of the alphabet : — The alphabet is constructed 
 and directed in this manner. The history and experiments 
 occupy first place . . . Since these are deficient, crucial 
 instances form designed history ... In case of any more 
 subtle experiment, the method is explained . . . Admo- 
 nitions and cautions likewise interspersed respecting the 
 fallacies of things. I attach my own observations . . . 
 Rules and imperfect axioms I set down provisionally . . . 
 Lastly, I sometimes make attempts at interpretation. For 
 the sake of clearness and order, some introductions to the 
 inquiries . . . For use, some reminders concerning practice 
 are suggested. To rouse human industry, a list of desi- 
 derata is proposed. The inquiries are so mixed up that 
 they fall under different titles . . . Such then is the rule 
 and plan of the alphabet. May God the Maker, the Pre- 
 server, the Eenewer of the universe, of His love and com- 
 passion to man, protect and guide this work, both in its 
 ascent to His glory, and its descent to the good of man, 
 through His only Son, God with us."— Spedding's Bacon. 
 
 Complete ciphers have, however, been presented to us, 
 each supporting the wish of the translator. One point 
 worthy of consideration is, that no cipher suggested is drawn 
 either from Bacon's works or from those of his instructors. 
 More than one cipher-reader jirofesses to find a different 
 cipher under different conditions in the same works, giving 
 the same chief conclusions, with different accessories. 
 How many cipher's can the same works enrol at the same 
 time is a new puzzle, more difficult to solve than the 
 authorship of Shakspere's pLoys. 
 
 Mrs. C. F. A. Windle, of San Francisco, has one pam- 
 phlet addressed to the New Shakspere Society in 1SS1, and 
 another to the Trustees of the British Museum in 1882, 
 On the Discovery of the Cipher of Francis Bacon, Lord 
 Verulam, alike in his Prose Writings and the iSliakspeare 
 Dramas, proving that he icrote the latter. She quotes Bacon 
 on cipher: — ••Writing in the received manner no way
 
 206 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 obstructs the pronunciation, but leaves it free. . . . But to 
 prevent all suspicion, we shall annex a cipher of our own 
 which has the highest perfection of a cipher, that of signi- 
 fying omnia per omnia." Mrs Win die says, " There is not 
 so much as a single line of all Bacon's prose works or 
 letters, as he has, with omniscient security and provision 
 transmitted them, without, as it now appears, its definite 
 design of a final conjoinder with this great resurrection, 
 and its assigned part in the fulfilment and proof of the 
 predestined miracle." She claims Montaigne's Essays for 
 him, and also adds : — " I have already hinted my belief 
 that the marvellous psychological phenomenon of his future 
 recognition by another mind was preconceived by Lord 
 Verulam as a part of the value to the world of his antici- 
 pated resurrection. It stamps his work with the miracle 
 of prophecy and fulfilment. . . . For myself, it were stupid 
 and soulless in me not to have felt in this revelation, as 
 it has come to me, a direction and inspiration something 
 more than merely natural — a mysterious intercommunica- 
 tion with the spirit of this first of all the departed, as still 
 existent, apart from, no less than in the immortal work, in 
 which it has been mine, as the favoured human agent, to 
 recover him to the world. ... I feel the deepest responsi- 
 bility resting on me to fulfil perfectly this duty, devolved on 
 me from the unseen realm ; more especially as I realise that 
 if left to another the true exposition will never he made." One 
 example given is from Cymbeline : " When at the time that 
 a Posthumous fame, borne of a British Lion shall, uncon- 
 sciously and without seeking, find itself embraced by the 
 tender ' Ariel ' of its own Book, Ah, Rare one ! and when 
 the branches of Bacon's poetry, philosophy, and virtue, 
 which lopped from the stately Cedar of Britain's renown 
 have been dead many years, shall afterwards revive, be 
 jointed to the old stock, and freshly grow, then shall the 
 misery of his delayed recognition terminate, Britain be 
 fortunate and flourish in peace and plenty." " I am assure
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 207 
 
 that the recognition of Bacon's title cannot be much longer 
 delayed." 
 
 Mrs. "Windle argues strongly against the possibility of a 
 successor. 
 
 The Sct7i Francisco Clironicle of August 20, 1882, criti- 
 cises her views, and adds : " As the work goes on, even the 
 plays are not adhered to, and Holy Writ and Montaigne's 
 Essays come in for an equal share of explanation. If by 
 this time the value of Mrs. Windle's discovery is not 
 apparent, it will need no further extracts to know that 
 too close an application to a ' startling exemplification in 
 philological science ' has wrought its mischief, and unsettled 
 a mind which, with proper use, might have produced some- 
 thing more valuable and less pitiable than a cipher." 
 
 In spite of her warning, a successor did appear to Mrs. 
 Windle. 
 
 A great contrast to the slender bulk of her cryptogram 
 are the mighty volumes of Mr. Donnelly's great crypto- 
 gram : — 
 
 " That the cipher is there ; that I have found it out ; 
 that the narrative given is real, no man can doubt who 
 reads this book to the end." 
 
 " A more brain-racking problem was never submitted to 
 the intellect of man." 
 
 " I was often reminded of the Western story of the lost 
 traveller whose highway changed into a waggon-road, his 
 waggon-road disappeared in a bridle-path, his bridle-path 
 merged into a cow-path, and his cow-path at last degene- 
 rated into a squirrel-track, which ran up a tree ! " 
 
 I quote three of Mr. Donnelly's own sentences, with the 
 first of which I disagree. 
 
 I have honestly done my duty, and have read the whole 
 of these weighty volumes from beginning to end. There 
 are some chapters in the work that possess interest and 
 value ; for instance, those on the parallelisms and identities 
 in thought, expression, constructions, and errors in Bacon
 
 2o8 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 and Shakspere. I respect the industry and perseverance 
 that have led the author through labours equal to those of 
 Hercules, and I only wish that more exactitude, honesty, 
 fairness, learning, and common sense had been added to 
 the industry, so that a book had been produced creditable 
 alike to Mr. Donnelly and his country. 
 
 The work divides itself naturally into two parts — the 
 resume 1 of what is called the Baconian theory proper ; and 
 Mr. Donnelly's own special contribution, which he calls 
 the Great Cryptogram, to distinguish it from others. In 
 regard to the general question, I consider that " the great 
 assizes holden in Parnassus " would not permit Mr. Don- 
 nelly to be a judge, or even to be a juryman or witness in 
 such a question, because he is — ist, Too violent a partisan. 
 A personal "animus" against Shakspere is shown in every 
 line, in every noun and adjective he flings at him. 2nd. 
 He is illogical in the reasonings he brings to bear on facts. 
 3rd. He is inconsistent in the adducing of the facts he 
 reasons from. 4th. He sometimes falsifies facts, either 
 through ignorance or selection. He says of Shakspere's 
 editors, "False in one point, false in all." But with, 
 Gratiano, we may thank him for teaching us a word that 
 sometimes so well applies to his work. 5th. The current 
 of his faith in his idea, and of his imagination, carries him 
 away. He was evidently intended to be an original poet. 
 
 Fortunately for us, the laws of authenticity of testimony 
 and credibility of witnesses decide that the opinion of the 
 large group of contemporaries who knew Shakspere and 
 Bacon is more valid than that of a man born about 300 
 years after them, in another hemisphere, even when he is 
 backed by a following of friends who think it would be 
 more congruous to their own thought that Bacon should 
 have written Shakspere. 
 
 The previous chapters have shown the weakness of the 
 ireneral case, the real points of difference in character, in 
 the works of the men, and in the testimony for each ; but
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 209 
 
 there seem to be some few points worth noticing in this 
 large work. 
 
 Mr. Donnelly is a master of bathos. " Here I would 
 remark that it is sorrowful, nay pitiful, nay shameful, to 
 read the fearful abuse which in sewer-rivers has deluged 
 the fair memory of Francis Bacon within the last four 
 months." I think Mr. Donnelly does not believe he is the 
 worst sinner in this respect, nor does he imagine that the 
 sentence might much more naturally be written of the 
 Baconians in tbeir abuse of Shakspere. They have dwelt 
 upon unauthenticated tradition (when it is uncomplimen- 
 tary), misjudged it, garbled it, and set it in opposition to 
 well authenticated writings. Truly, as was once said of the 
 Pharisees, " Ye have made the Scriptures of none effect 
 through your tradition." And when Mr. Donnelly does judge 
 from writings, he selects the unsavoury, dwells on them, 
 magnifies them, and clouds therewith his style and reason- 
 ing, ignoring all points that tell against him, and attempt- 
 ing to make his readers do the same. What though 
 Stratford was at times " unsavoury " ? All towns of the 
 period were and some of a much later date. Erasmus and 
 De Witt speak strongly against the uncleanliness and 
 coarse habits of the nation at the time. Great ladies car- 
 ried sweet odoured balls "to smell to," when they became 
 aware of the offensive. Can a poet not escape to the 
 woodlands and the primrose banks ? And after all, even 
 though the whole question is utterly irrelevant, is open- 
 air drainage more injurious to brain power than a drainage 
 that gives a superficial tidiness and sends the deadly drain- 
 poisoned airs through chink and cranny to suck the life 
 out of body and soul like a vampire bat 1 
 
 Mr. Donnelly says Shakspere had nearly every vice, and 
 was disgraced in the eyes of men in every way ; that he 
 was coarse, vulgar, and ugly; was indeed the original of 
 Falstaff, of crooked Richard, and of Caliban ! 
 
 "In the greatest age of English literature the greatest
 
 210 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTIOX. 
 
 man of his species lives in London for nearly thirty years, 
 and no man takes any note of his presence ! " Has he not 
 read Dr. Ingleby's Centurie of Prayse ? His superiority to 
 " his fellows " and those who acted and wrote for the stage 
 may be seen by the position he had taken towards them 
 in seven years after his arrival in London. 
 
 " Compare the little we know of him, and the much we 
 know of Ben Jonson." The men are different; Jonson is 
 like Bacon, and wishes to let men know about him. 
 
 The most original thing that Mr. Donnelly says of him, 
 though he means it as a crowning insult, might have been 
 believed. He says : " I have proved he was a brewer." 
 " We peep into the kitchen of New Place, Stratford, and 
 we see the occupant brewing beer." Looking back to the 
 early chapter that proves this, I find it really must be 
 transcribed as a fine specimen of the style of Mr. Donnelly's 
 " reasonings." 
 
 " Shakspere a brewer. 
 
 " He carried on brewing in New Place. 
 
 " It is very probable the alleged author of Hamlet carried 
 on the business of brewing beer in his residence at New 
 Place. He sued Philip Rogers in 1604 for several bushels 
 of ' malt' sold him at various times between March 27 and 
 the end of May of that year, amounting in all to the value 
 of £1, 15s- iod." 
 
 " The business of beer-making was not unusual among his 
 townsmen. 
 
 "George Perrye, besides his glover's trade, useth buying 
 and selling of wool and yarn and making of malte." 
 
 " Robert Butler, besides his glover's occupation, useth 
 making of malte." 
 
 " Rychard Castell, Rother Market, useth his glover's 
 occupation, his wife uttering weeklye by bruying ij strikes 
 of malte." 
 
 " Mr. Persons for a long tyme used malting of malte and 
 bruyinge to sell in his house." — {Old MSS., 1595.)
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 211 
 
 (This is taken from the notes to Mr. Hallivvell- Phillips's 
 Outlines of the Life of Shakespeare, without the con- 
 text.) 
 
 "Think of the author of Hamlet and of Lear brewing 
 beer ! " 
 
 But Mr. Donnelly mistakes. It is no proof that he 
 should hold malt, and that other men who held malt brewed 
 beer to sell. Malt was often received as rent, often as 
 tithes. Malting and brewing were carried on in every 
 gentleman's house of the kingdom at that time ; but the 
 only home in which it is proved that the Head of the House 
 concerned himself with the manufacture was Bacon's; 
 because we have his experiments, written with his own 
 hand. 1 Therefore, if Bacon did write Hamlet and Lear, we 
 must " think of the author of these plays as brewing beer," 
 though we have no authority that Shakspere did. But 
 why should he not 1 Mortal men do not live the whole 
 twenty-four hours on the Mount of Transfiguration. 
 
 " The identities of the question of temperance," I have 
 illustrated as the strongest contrast in Chapter iii. 
 
 " It is a little surprising that a writer whose sympathies 
 were always with the aristocracy should convert the finest 
 house in Stratford, built by Sir Hugh Clopton, into a 
 Brewery, and employ himself peddling out malt to his 
 neighbours, and sueing them when they did not pay 
 promptly. And taken in connection with the sale of malt, 
 there is another curious fact that throws some light upon 
 the character of the man of the household. In the Cham- 
 berlain's account of Stratford we find a charge in 1 6 1 4 for 
 ' one quart of sack and one quart of clarett wine given to 
 a preacher at the New Place.' What manner of man must 
 he have been who would require the town to pay for the 
 wine he furnished his guests ? " It seems to be forgotten 
 that towns often gave handsome gifts to individuals ; that 
 in this case the smallness of the gift to the preacher who 
 
 1 Jiee Chap. iii. 
 
 O
 
 212 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 had pleased them all depended on the knowledge that he 
 had been liberally treated at the best house in the place. 
 The choice of wine was not unusual for a gift. 
 
 Mr. Donnelly follows the well-known legal trick classed 
 among the Logical Fallacies — " No case ; abuse the plain- 
 tiff's attorney, or himself." So he abuses Warwickshire, 
 Stratford, 1 the house where Shakspere was born ; forgetful 
 that for the period it was large and substantial enough for 
 a man in a very good position. He abuses his name, his 
 family and himself, and his supporters, in every possible 
 way. 
 
 He (Donnelly) tries to suggest vile thoughts of Shak- 
 spere, and even that there " was something wrong in the 
 breed," because Shakspere's first child appeared sooner than 
 is usual after marriage. Pope's biography can prove that no 
 explanation of this need be necessary, but we must further 
 remember that the habits of the time were different from 
 ours ; tbat the pre-contract or betrothal had a more binding 
 force than the engagement of our clays, and was equivalent 
 to a civil marriage. Surely in times when the same tiling 
 happened in the cases of Sir Walter Raleigh and Earl 
 Southampton, at older age, without blame or disgrace, 
 there is no need to annihilate a man so young for a fault 
 that he repaired as fully as he could, if there were a fault 
 at all. And we must clearly remember there is no authority 
 for any suspicion of a further blot on his fair fame through 
 life. 
 
 Mr. Donnelly, however, says Shakspere was a " usurer." 
 I think that he was a man who had discovered the uses of 
 adversity, and learned the lessons of experience, and that, 
 seeing that his father had lost his fair chances for himself 
 
 1 By the way, this was before he had seen it. When he went down 
 this spring to Stratford, I have it on very good authority that he was 
 surprised at the apparently respectable character of the "Birthplace." 
 Further, he was surprised that the Stratfordians were not more angry 
 with him and his book. One of their seniors mildly said, " It does not 
 affect us in the least."
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 213 
 
 and family by carelessness in money matters, he had deter- 
 mined the value alike of exactitude and economy. 
 
 " He combined with others to oppress the poor, when an 
 attempt was made to enclose the public lands ; " while the 
 fact remains on record that he opposed and prevented the 
 enclosures. The only certain utterance of Shakspere that 
 has come down to us is, " I cannot bear the enclosing of 
 Welcombe." " He was a mean peasant, and lied to beg a 
 coat of arms for his father." * Facts are against Mr. Don- 
 nelly here also. Shakspere's honour was unimpeached. 
 " The author of the plays was a profound scholar and labo- 
 rious student, and therefore must be Bacon." Most students 
 differ from Mr. Donnelly in the degree of profundity appa- 
 rent, which would take a volume as large as his own to 
 contest, and he does not seem to be aware of the character 
 his fellow-dramatist, Webster, gave Shakspere for his " right 
 happy and copious industry ; " nor of the opportunities he 
 had for education late in life, even if he had neglected his 
 school-tasks ; nor of the numerous translations of foreign 
 authorities then extant. 
 
 Some questions are asked which all would like to be able 
 to answer. There are, of course, some extraordinary things 
 in connexion with him, or Mr. Donnelly would not have 
 had the chance of writing this book. Five-and-a-half 
 volumes of the large catalogues of names of books in the 
 British Museum are occupied by the titles of editions of 
 Shakspere, or books written about him. The chief difficulty 
 in studying him is this fact. But we must remember that 
 fires happened frequently then, and were often on the trail 
 of Shakspere; that the Globe was burned down in 16 13 ; 
 that a great fire occurred in Stratford in 16 14; that Ben 
 Jonson was in Stratford-on-Avon in 16 16, at the time of 
 Shakspere's death ; that probably he took some of Shak- 
 spere's papers to London with him ; that Ben Jonson's 
 papers were destroyed by fire late in the same year. The 
 
 1 Appendix, Note 9.
 
 2i 4 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 will of his son-in-law, Dr. Hall, who with his wife was his 
 residuary legatee in 1635, says: "Concerning my study of 
 bookes, I leave them to my sonn Nash, to dispose of them 
 as you see good. As for my manuscripts, I would have 
 given them to Mr. Boles if he had been here ; but foras- 
 much as he is not here present, you may, son Nash, burn 
 them, or do with them what you please." Some of these 
 were original, 1 though some may have been Shakspere's. 
 There is a tradition that a grand-nephew of his had a large 
 box of his papers, which were destroyed in the great fire 
 at Warwick ; and there is no doubt that the great fire of 
 London, t668, destroyed many homes where many records 
 of Shakspere would have been preserved. 
 
 Mr. Donnelly having annihilated the possibilities of Shak- 
 spere having had anything to do with the plays, attempts 
 to put up Bacon in his place, and supports his case on 
 Carlyle, who, he says, makes this most significant speech : 
 " The wisdom displayed in Shakspere was equal in pro- 
 foundness to the great Lord Bacon's Novum Organum." 
 Our edition of Carlyle says otherwise : " It is unexampled, 
 that calm creative perspicacity of Shakspere. . . . Novum 
 Organum, and all the intellect you will find in Bacon, is of 
 a quite secondary order — earthy, material, poor in com- 
 parison with this." 2 
 
 Because Bacon writes a better hand than Shakspere he 
 was more likely to write the plays. 
 
 "The writer of the plays must have been in Scotland." 
 Bacon is not proved to have gone so far, while Burbage's 
 
 1 " Select Observations on English Bodies, or Cures both Empericall 
 and Historicall performed upon very eminent persons in desperate dis- 
 eases, first written in Latin by Mr. John Hall, Physician, living at 
 Stratford-on-Avon, in Warwickshire, where he was very famous, as 
 also in the counties adjacent, as appears by these Observations drawn 
 out of severall hundreds of his, as choysest ; now put into English for 
 common benefit by James Cooke, Practitioner in Physick and Chirur- 
 gery," 1657. 
 
 2 Heroes and Hero- Worship-
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 215 
 
 company played in Edinburgh in 1601, and it is more than 
 probable Shakspere was with them. It is discovered that 
 Ben Jonson uses the same phrase once in regard to Bacon 
 and Shakspere. Of Shakspere, in 1623 — 
 
 " When thy socks are on 
 Leave thee alone for the comparison 
 Of all that insolent Greece or haughty Rome." 
 
 This phrase impressed Jonson as a good one, and, after 
 the manner of his patron Bacon, he serves it up again 
 rechauffe in his Discoveries when he placed Bacon among 
 the great Orators that treated oratory as an art. It is 
 possible he had thought of Mark Antony's oration when 
 he applied that phrase to Shakspere, and by associated 
 ideas quoted it for Bacon. 
 
 "Bacon's imagination is revealed in his works;" for 
 instance, " For as statues and pictures are dumb histories, 
 so histories are speaking pictures." This, like many others 
 of Mr. Donnelly's, is an unfortunate selection, as it is 
 cribbed from Simonides without any acknowledgment — a 
 common habit of Bacon's. 
 
 "Bacon took part in many plays." He wrote some 
 Masques, which nobles played in, bat he chiefly concerned 
 himself with the decorative part of the getting up of others. 
 " Why was it the fountain of Shakspere's song closed as 
 soon as Bacon's necessities ended ? " asks Mr. Donnelly. 
 Other Baconians insist that because they kept appearing 
 after Shakspere's death Bacon wrote them. 
 
 Mr. Donnelly gives a Syllogism in Camestres to prove 
 Shakspere could not have written the plays, because a 
 lawyer must have done so. 
 
 " The writer of the plays was a lawyer. 
 
 Shakspere was not a lawyer. 
 .*. He did not write the plays." 
 
 He says afterwards, " Nothing is more conclusively proved
 
 216 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 than that the author of the plays was a lawyer." Surely a 
 logical syllogism, even if perfect in form, goes beyond its 
 duty in proving the material truth of its premises. It is 
 still to be proved that Shakspere was not a lawyer, and 
 that a lawyer wrote the plays. And it strikes others that 
 reasonings are more conclusive when based on true uni- 
 versal than on singulars. This would produce — 
 
 All writers of plays are lawyers. 
 No Shaksperes are lawyers. 
 . \ No Shaksperes are writers of plays. 
 
 Which, being converted into Celarent in the First Figure, 
 would read — 
 
 No lawyers are Shaksperes. 
 All writers of plays are lawyers. 
 .•. No writers of plays are Shaksperes. 
 x .•. No Shaksperes are writers of plays. 
 
 But while we may allow the first premise, we must 
 deny the second ; and this syllogism would fall, as Mr. 
 Donnelly's would, on the premises being proved untrue. 
 
 " Bacon is naturally given to secretiveness, and seeks a 
 disguise." That may be true. In his Essay on Truth he 
 says, " The admixture of a lie cloth ever make truth more 
 pleasant." 
 
 Mr. Donnelly quotes Mr. "Watts, and agrees with him in 
 taking as a support of this view Jonson's lines on Lord 
 Bacon's birthday — 
 
 "Thou standst as if a mystery thou didst." 
 
 But this is another instance of the unwisdom of taking 
 their authorities without the context. Because any ordi- 
 nary person reading these lines would see that Jonson, 
 impressed with the dignity of the ancestral home of his 
 friend, addressed the genius of that home. It is wise to 
 give it in full, that this may be once for all understood.
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 217 
 
 LORD BACON'S BIRTHDAY 
 
 (his sixtieth). 
 
 Hail, happy genius of this ancient pile ! 
 How comes it all things so about thee smile ? 
 The fire, the wine, the men ! and in the midst 
 Thou standst as if some mystery thou didst. 
 Pardon, I read it in thy face, the day 
 For whose returns, and many, all these pray, 
 And so do I. This is the sixtieth year 
 Since Bacon and thy Lord was born, and here ; 
 Son to the grave, wise Keeper of the Seal, 
 Fame and foundation of the English weal. 
 What then his father was, that since is he. 
 Now with a title more to the degree ; 
 England's high Chancellor, the destined heir 
 In his soft cradle to his father's chair ; 
 Whose even thread the fates spin round and full 
 Out of their choicest and their whitest wool. 
 'Tis a brave cause of joy, let it be known, 
 For 'twere a narrow gladness, kept thine own. 
 Give me a deep-crowned bowl, that I may sing 
 In raising him, the wisdom of my King. 
 
 " If he had been known to have written plays and poems, 
 it would have been dangerous to his worldly success." 
 Why did poems not hinder the worldly advancement of 
 other men, Sackville, Spenser, Raleigh, Sir John Davies 
 even, to whom he wrote begging him to be good to "con- 
 cealed poets " 1 I do indeed wonder that Mr. Donnelly did 
 not claim more for him when he was at it. If Bacon 
 wrote all his own works, all Shakspere's, all Montaigne's, 
 all Burton's, all Marlowe's and the minor Dramatist s ] 
 productions, all anonymous works (as he demands for him), 
 surely this sentence might have engulphed those of Sir 
 John Davies 1 also, who writes a philosophic work and 
 metrical translation of some Psalms. Mr. Donnelly proves 
 so much, that the same reasonings would prove much 
 
 1 Appendix, Note 15.
 
 218 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 more. " Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy is not at all 
 unlike his style, therefore he wrote it." " When it was first 
 attributed to Burton I do not know." The book was 
 signed in the first edition of 162 1 at the end; not signed 
 in the second of 1624; in the third of 1628, nor in the 
 fourth of 1632. But that it was attributed to him is 
 proved in the "Stationers' Eegisters of 24 May 1622, 
 when Michael Sparkes entered for his copies, under the 
 hand of Master Knight, Warden, and by consent of Henry 
 Grippes, all the estate that the said Henry Crippes hath in 
 the three copies hereafter mentioned, viz., Burton's Melan- 
 colie, Goodwin's Antiquities, and A Sermon of Peter du 
 Moulin." Mr. Donnelly also forgets that Bacon was a 
 Cambridge man, and that Burton was an Oxford man; 
 that the book was printed at Oxford by Henry Crippes 
 throughout, but was probably sent to London for purposes 
 of publication. He also forgets that Burton gives all his 
 authorities, and discloses the exact range of his reading, 
 which Bacon never does. 
 
 Mrs. Windle had suggested that Bacon wrote Montaigne ; 
 Mr. Donnelly clings to the idea. "We are brought face 
 to face with this dilemma ; either Francis Bacon wrote the 
 Essays of Montaigne, or Francis Bacon stole many of his 
 noblest thoughts and the whole scheme of his philosophy 
 from Montaigne." The choice is fair, but there is no 
 dilemma at all. Bacon invariably takes every good thing 
 he finds in his reading, assimilates it, uses it, thanks God 
 and himself for it, and says nothing of the debt to his 
 ignorant public. 
 
 "The whole publication of the folio of 1623 is based on 
 a fraudulent statement. . . . False in one thing, false in 
 all." The MSS. of Heming and Condell were probably the 
 playhouse copies, the earlier editions being pirated from 
 eager listeners catching up the occasionally varied acting 
 forms ; and, as it is perfectly certain that Shakspere in act- 
 ing would modify his phrases to his peculiar mood at the
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 219 
 
 time, that quite accounts for the singular variations in the 
 texts. " If the plays are not Shakspere's, then the whole 
 make-up of the folio is a fraud, and the dedication and the 
 introduction are probably both from the pen of Bacon " — 
 which means, in short, if Shakspere wrote the plays, it was 
 a fraud ; if Shakspere did not write the plays, it was a fraud ; 
 but either Shakspere or Bacon wrote the plays, so in either 
 case it was a fraud. Query, would the fraud be nobler if 
 Bacon perpetrated it than if Heming and Condell did 1 
 Would not the falseness affect Bacon in this case more 
 radically than the loving-hearted slips of an actor who 
 wished to commemorate his dead poet ? 
 
 We now come to the cipher. We cannot but remark 
 the extraordinary manner in which the cipher supports, 
 in a coarse, vulgar, pointless story, in un-Baconian language, 
 the opinions of the Baconian Theory. Yet surely no insult 
 to the dignity and character of Bacon, no insult to his 
 knowledge and style, was ever offered by any one like to 
 this. That he could have invented and inserted Donnelly's 
 cipher in the plays ! It crowns all. 
 
 The conclusions that might be drawn from this part are 
 the following : — 1st, Mr. Donnelly's, that Bacon wrote the 
 plays and inserted the cipher. No man that had any 
 notion of the dignity of poetry could so degrade it by 
 making it a packhorse to bear a burden of mean prose- 
 gossip. Were that supposition granted, his character 
 would be stained, and he would be considered a liar, a 
 hypocrite, and a plagiarist of no ordinary meanness. For 
 besides all the dishonesty of the publications and dedications 
 of the Folio, he would have to bear the odium of copying 
 Plutarch, Tacitus, &c, and cribbing all other previous play- 
 wrights' works, without having any right to do so. And 
 we must remember that what in Shakspere — actor, manager, 
 playwright as well as poet — was justified and justifiable, in 
 Bacon would be gross plagiarism and contemptible literary 
 robbery, and that Ben Jonson's epigram on The Poet Ape
 
 220 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 must then be applied to Bacon, and thereby intensified, and 
 that his speeches and dedications to the Queen were not 
 mere exaggerations, but hypocritical lies, which I for one do 
 not believe. 
 
 2nd, " But another of those luminous intellects (whose 
 existence is a subject of perpetual perplexity to those who 
 reverence God) has made the further suggestion that, 
 granted there is a cipher in the plays, Bacon put it there 
 to cheat Shakspere out of his just rights and honours." 
 There is much to be said in support of this " luminous 
 intellect." If Bacon could crib from Montaigne enough to 
 fix Mr. Donnelly between the two horns of a dilemma, why 
 should he not do more ? " False in one point, false in all." 
 We thank thee for that word again. We have seen that 
 he at least borrowed many hints. And the very cipher 
 which Bacon claims, which suggested to Mr. Donnelly 
 his years of patient labour, was cribbed from Vigenere's 
 volume, and taken possession of loithout acknowledgment. 
 If he stole the cipher, what was there to prevent him 
 stealing the plays, think some. We do not think so. 
 Bacon only appropriated what he valued, and his own works 
 prove that he did not value the plays. 
 
 3rd, A third conclusion has come to some, that Mi*. 
 Donnelly put there what he found there, or manipulated 
 things to the obscuring of the senses, after the principles 
 of Messrs. Maskelyne and Cooke. As Mr. Donnelly assures 
 us he did not, we accept his word, though we think it one 
 of the most slipshod ciphers that ever has been found out, 
 and one that Bacon would have been ashamed of. In no 
 case is any regularity of any method strictly adhered to, 
 and the root-numbers are varied by the reader at will. A 
 cipher in such conditions is utterly valueless. Cipher 
 value at any time only lies in the certainty of transmitting 
 exactly the writer's meaning. But when numbers are used 
 that vary, and when selections are made, sometimes of whole 
 words, sometimes of syllables jin words, in^which the re-
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 221 
 
 maining syllables are either counted as a word or not, as 
 Mr. Donnelly pleases — it is evident that he must do it 
 intending to find what he did find. Certainly it is more 
 intricate and ingenious than that of Mrs. Windle, but she 
 had the advantage of priority, and of making no enthusiastic 
 pretence to exactitude. The tales she educes are also more 
 poetically told. Does "one nail not drive out another" 
 here ? 
 
 4th, But there is a fourth possibility that I claim as 
 original. As men used to seek the Sortes Virgiliance, many 
 have sought the Sortes Shalcspereance. Is it not possible 
 that what materialists might call chance, fatalists fate, or 
 superstition-mongers the ministers of the black art, might 
 have arranged the words so as to have tempted Mr. Donnelly 
 to find a sequence in the unconnected and a story in chance 
 words 1 The style of the Cryptogram narrative is wonder- 
 fully like the Oracular. That these same powers generally 
 help a man to spell out what he wants to see is very well 
 
 known. 
 
 " Black spirits and white, 
 Red spirits and grey, 
 Mingle, mingle, mingle, 
 You that mingle may." 
 
 But the general experience is that the "mingling" is 
 neither profitable nor pleasant in the long-run. Macbeth 
 began " to doubt the equivocation of the fiend that lied 
 like truth," and concluded : — 
 
 " Be these juggling fiends no more believed, 
 That palter with us in a double sense ; 
 That keep the word of promise to our ear 
 And break it to our hope." 
 
 Though fiends and faith have alike gone out of fashion, 
 it is just possible that the "mingling" remains, and that 
 this is a specimen. 
 
 I could find a possible fifth conclusion, but will not 
 suggest it ; so here is a Tetralemma, a more horned animal
 
 222 THE DACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 even than the Montaigne Dilemma. The worst of it is, 
 that each horn buffets somebody — either Bacon, whom we 
 reverence for what he has really done or been ; or Mr. 
 Donnelly, whom we ought to reverence for what he wanted 
 to do. None of them affect Shakspere at all. 
 
 Mr. Donnelly says Bacon was the original " Hamlet" and 
 "Prospero." "Miranda" is "the Works of Alphabet;" 
 but that is worked out by the application of Mrs. Windle's 
 cipher. Mr. Donnelly's is too intricate to give anything 
 so simple. According to his own showing, the intricacies 
 of the cipher pressed as heavily upon Bacon as on himself. 
 
 " The cipher pressed him hard when he wrote such a 
 sentence as this : ' Thy horse 1 will sooner con an oration ' " 
 (Troilus and Cressida, Act ii. sc. i). "As there is no 
 Francisco present or anywhere in the play, this is all 
 rambling nonsense, and the word is dragged in for a pur- 
 pose." "Are there any other plays in the world where 
 characters appear for an instant, and disappear in this 
 extraordinary fashion, saying nothing and doing nothing?" 
 " What was. the purpose of this nonsensical scene, which, as 
 some one has said, is about on the par of a negro-minstrel 
 show ? ... It enabled the author to bring in the name of 
 Francis twenty times in less than a column." " The com- 
 plicated exigencies of the cipher compel Bacon to talk 
 nonsense." And so Mr. Donnelly is content. He fancies 
 that as he proves that the plays are too good to be written 
 by Shakspere, that Bacon wrote them ; but that, at the same 
 time, they contain much "nonsense," — a form of literature 
 specially unlikely to have been written by Bacon. Be sure 
 that Mr. Donnelly could not prove that without talking 
 much nonsense himself. " Let us examine this. The 
 
 1 I found in reading the old Stationers' Registers an interesting 
 history of the craft that gives some facts that might lend a double 
 meaning to this word : — "Every printing-house is called a chapel."*'. . . 
 The compositors are called galley-slaves ; and the press-men are jocosely 
 called horses, because of the hard labour they go through all day long."
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 223 
 
 word Bacon is an unusual word in literary work. ... I 
 undertake to say that the reader cannot find in any work 
 of prose or poetry, not a biography of Bacon, in that age, 
 or any subsequent age, where no reference was intended 
 to be made to the man Bacon, such another collocation 
 of Nicholas — Bacon — Bacon-fed — Bacons. I challenge the 
 sceptical to undertake the task ! " And I, the sceptical, 
 accept the challenge. In Gammer Gurton's Needle, 1 printed 
 1575, Mr. Donnelly will find "Bacons" enough to prove 
 that play written by Queen Elizabeth's little Lord Keeper 
 at the age of thirteen, as his cipher applied to it would 
 bring out the same conclusions. 
 
 Gammer Gurton's Needle was acted at Christ's College, 
 Cambridge, before 1575 ; and though later than Nicholas 
 Udall's Ralph Roister Doister, is by many considered the 
 first English Comedy. I give a few selections : — 
 
 (First Act. First Scene.) 
 
 Diccon. Many a peece of bacon have I had out of their balke?, 
 In roming over the countrie in long and wery walkes. 
 . . . When I saw it booted not, out at doores I hied mee, 
 And caught a slip of bacon, when I saw none spyed mee. 
 Which I intend, not far hence, unless my purpose fayle, 
 Shall serve for a shoeing home to draw on two pots of ale. 
 
 2nd Act. The Song. " Back and side go bare," &c. 
 
 Diccon. Well done, by Gog's Malt, well sung and well sayde. . . . 
 
 Hodge. A pestilence light on all ill luck, chad thought yet for 
 all this, 
 Of a morsel of bacon behinde the dore, at worst should not misse, 
 But when I sought a slyp to cut, as I was wont to do- 
 Gog's soul, Diccon, Gyp our cat, had eat the bacon too. 
 (Which bacon Diccon stole, as is declared before.) 
 
 1 "A right pithy, pleasant and merrie Comedy, intituled Gammer 
 Gurton's Needle, played on Stage not longe ago in Christes Colledge 
 in Cambridge. Made by Mr. S. Master of Art. Irnprented at London, 
 in Fleet street, benethe the Conduit, at the signe of St. John Evan- 
 gelist, by Thomas Col well, 1 575-"
 
 224 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 Diccon. Ill luck, quod he ? Mary swere it Hodge, this day the 
 truth tel. 
 Thou rose not on thy right side, or els blest thee not wel, 
 Thy milk slopt up, thy bacon filched, that was too bad luck— Hodge ! " 
 
 We can also read in Marlowe's Jew of Malta, 1594 : — 
 
 " Excellent ! He stands as if he were begging of Bacon." 
 
 " I am Gluttony ; my parents are all dead, and the devil a penny 
 have they left me but a small pension ; and that buys me thirty meals 
 a day and ten bevers, a small trifle to suffice nature. I come of a 
 Royal Pedigree ; my father was a Gammon of Bacon, and my mother 
 was a Hogshead of Claret Wine." — Marlowe : Dr. Faustus, ii. 2. 
 
 In the Return from Pernassus, 1597 : — 
 
 " Studiosus. That I shoulde fare no worse than their owne houshold 
 servantes did ; have breade and beere and Bacon enoughe, while my 
 Mistress Mincing Avaritia said, ' There was not suche an house within 
 forty miles.' " 
 
 Thomas Randolph, addressing Ben Jonson, says, 1632 : — 
 
 " Ben, do not leave the stage. . . . 
 Wilt thou engross thy store 
 
 Of wheat and pour no more, 
 Because their BACON-brains have such a taste 
 As more delight in mast ? . . ." 
 
 Since my first edition I am glad to find that the Rev. 
 Dr. Nicholson of St. Albans, Leamington, has mathe- 
 matically refuted the cipher, and proved the truth of the 
 fourth possibility I suggested regarding it, that " the equi- 
 vocation of the fiend that lied like truth " need not be held 
 as the truth. For Dr. Nicholson finds that the same cipher 
 can be made to prove exactly the opposite facts ; not that 
 he thereby holds that he has proved the opposite, but that 
 neither reading nor rendering is worth anything, and that 
 the result is nil. 
 
 The Rev. Dr. Nicholson's little book is named, "No 
 Cipher in Shakespeare : a Refutation of the Hon. Ignatius 
 Donnelly's Great Cryptogram." He proves by the abstruse 
 workings of Mr. Donnelly's own root-numbers and modi-
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 225 
 
 fiers, that under five variations of modifiers the cipher 
 produces, " Master William Shakspeare writ this play, 
 and was engaged at the Curtain," and " I, William, son to 
 John Shakespeare, got the honour of a herald's coat of 
 arms, on a painted field, for the ancient services of mine 
 house to King Henry, in King Richard's time in Warwick- 
 shire." This, then, should be held to be five times as 
 strong. It is important to remark that this Shakespearean 
 cipher is of a more Elizabethan style than Mr. Donnelly's. 
 But of course, on this account, Dr. Nicholson does not 
 prove that Shakspere inserted a cipher in the plays, but 
 simply that there is none at all. The utterly unscientific 
 nature of principle and process is clearly shown on the natu- 
 ral laws of figures, in a way that must 2 )0se Mr. Donnelly 
 once and for ever. Dr. Nicholson shows how when a key 
 does not fit the lock, it may be filed to fit it, or the wards 
 may be tampered with. And this Mr. Donnelly has done. 
 The words, " Sir, to amiss loose see look upon it as a bold 
 plot," are said to mean " Sir Thomas Lucy," &c. 
 
 " Further, Mr. Donnelly gives himself the advantage of 
 counting the words in any one of four different ways to 
 suit his experiment. 1. Omitting both b and Jt. 2. Add- 
 ing both b and b. 3. Adding b only. 4. Adding h 
 only." That he may make a new mode of calculation, 
 whenever required, by confounding together two counts of 
 the same series, and forming the topsy-turvy principle. 
 Hence, as the operation is not uniform, it is of no value as 
 a cipher, even to those who know what to expect. 
 
 Dr. Nicholson's facts are : — 
 
 1. There is no key, or at least no reason to choose any 
 
 of the five keys. 
 
 2. There is no fixed way of counting. 
 
 3. When each of the five keys have been applied in vain, 
 
 then the filing must begin. 
 
 4. There is no rule to confine any of the modifiers to any 
 
 particular key-number or root.
 
 226 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 5. When the key is modified and converted, there is no 
 
 rule to apply it to any page or column. 
 
 6. By means of these, any story desired can be got. 
 
 7. Either by Mr. Donnelly or his contradictors. 
 
 8. The law of combinations gives an incalculable number 
 
 of chances to pick up the words desired. 
 
 9. The reservation of a secret master-number is a mere 
 
 delusion. 
 
 Dr. Nicholson also alludes to the discredit it would have 
 been to Bacon to have been associated in any way with the 
 low person evoked by the Cryptogram cipher ; and yet, low 
 as he was, the ungrateful Bacon trusted his word, his faith, 
 his silence, though at one time his life hung on the mercy 
 of this player-mask, whose one tell-tale word would have 
 cost Bacon his life, and brought in a rich harvest of reward. 
 
 The Cryptogram is indeed like a Frankenstein, which 
 must produce fear and terror in its evoker. 
 
 I am truly glad that the Rev. Dr. Nicholson has taken 
 the trouble to review this question as he does. It disposes 
 at once of a strong argument the Baconians have often 
 brought forward. " We would have had an answer given 
 us were there any answer to bring." Now the answer has 
 been brought, and it is sufficient. " False in one point, 
 false in all." Habet ! 
 
 Mr. Wyman of Cincinnati publishes a Bibliography of 
 the publications on each side of the Bacon -Shakspere 
 question. The bulk of these are in pamphlets, magazines, 
 and newspapers, with the exceptions of the books I have 
 mentioned. 
 
 " Bacon versus Shakespeare, a Plea for the Defendant," by 
 Thomas King, Montreal, appeared in 1875, m answer to 
 Judge Holmes. He denies the poetic faculty to Bacon, 
 claims the author of the plays as a Warwickshire man, and 
 gives a list of his authorities. 
 
 I have not been able to read or find this book, so cannot 
 in any way criticise it.
 
 BACON'S CIPHERS. 227 
 
 Another book appeared since the publication of my first 
 edition, and came to my notice after the second edition was 
 in the press, which I have only had time to read — Is there 
 any Resemblance between Shakespeare and Bacon ? by Charles 
 F. Steel, an American gentleman. It is an exceedingly in- 
 teresting and well- written book on the Shaksperean side. 
 
 With this I conclude the earnest labours of many months, 
 begun at first simply for the purpose of self-education, 
 afterwards for the purpose of publication. For I found 
 that many had been confused by the specious arguments 
 of the Baconians, in the absence of any answer more per- 
 manent than magazine or newspaper articles. For the 
 sake of those chiefly who live too far from the British 
 Museum to be able to verify the facts for themselves, I 
 worked out and published my little book, and have now 
 expanded it. A few have thought lightly of the need, and 
 have suggested that I am merely " slaying the thrice 
 slain." These should remember that Antaeus regained life 
 each time he touched his mother-earth. I am attempting 
 to remove the question from its mother-earth in not leaving 
 it " a place whereon to stand." The true philosophic spirit 
 teaches us to " prove all things ; " so that it may be wise at 
 times to pause and review even our most cherished beliefs ; 
 but it also teaches us to believe those facts that satisfy the 
 nature and needs of proof ; and such a proved fact I believe 
 this to be — that Shakspere wrote the plays and poems that 
 have always been attributed to him. 
 
 " Our Shakespeare wrote, too, in an age as blest, 
 The happiest poet of his time and best ; 
 A gracious Prince's favour cheered his Muse, 
 A constant favour he ne'er feared to lose. 
 Therefore he wrote with fancy uncoiifined. 
 And thoughts that were immortal as his mind ; 
 And from the crop of his luxuriant pen 
 E'er since succeeding poets humbly glean." 
 
 (The History and Fall of Cuius Mariug, 
 Otway, 16S0.) 
 
 P
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 Note i. — Warwickshire. 
 
 In Becon's Jewell of Joyc, published 1560, dedicated to Elizabeth. 
 he makes Philemon, Eusebius, Theophile, and Christopher talk 
 together of the religious state of the kingdom. Philemon, who is 
 evidently Becon himself, had been driven from town by persecutions 
 of enemies. He first travelled into Derbyshire, where, at the Peak, 
 he met one Christian gentleman, which he and his friends considered 
 marvellous in so barbarous a region. Philemon went next to Stafford, 
 Leicestershire, and Warwickshire, supporting himself everywhere 
 he went by teaching. His testimony is important: — "I departed 
 into Warwykeshere, where in lyke manner as afore I frelye enjoyed 
 the lyberallytie of my most swete and deare frende John Olde, 
 whych, impelled by urgent causes, departed into that country for 
 to inhabite. There lykewise taught I divers gentlemen's sonnes. 
 whyche I truste, if they live, shall be a beautie to the publique 
 weale of England, both for the preferment of true religion, and for 
 the mayntenance of justice. 
 
 Euse. Howe fancied you that countrye ? 
 
 Phile. I travelled boeth in Darbyeshire in the Peke, in Stafford- 
 shire, and in Lecestershere ; yet Warwykeshere was to me most 
 dere and pleasant. 
 
 Chris. Howe so ? 
 
 Phile. In Lecestershire (as 1 may pass over the other) I had 
 familyarite only wyth one learned man, a countryman of oures 
 called John Aylmer, a master of arte of the Universitie of Cam- 
 bridge, but Warwykeshere mynistred unto me the acqueytaunce and 
 frendshyppe of many learned men. 
 
 Chris. What are theyr names, I prey you ? 
 
 J'hilc. Firste commeth to my remembrance a man worthy to be 
 loved and reverenced of all Chrystene menne, not only for the 
 puernes of hys lyfe, whyche hath alwayes before the world been
 
 2 3 o APPENDIX. 
 
 innocent and blameles, but also for the synceritie and godlynes 
 of hys Evangelique doctrine, whyche since the beginning of his 
 preaching hath in all poyntes been so conformable to the teaching of 
 Christe . . . Maister Latimer . . . sometime Bishop of Worcester." 
 Philemon had been a child of 16 at Cambridge when he heard his 
 sermons there, showing that the Scriptures ought to be read to the 
 people. "With this true preacher of God's word I chaunced in 
 Warwykeshire to be somewhat acquainted (which was to me of no 
 small comforte), not with him only, but with divers others, whereof 
 some were men of worship wel bente towards the Holy Scriptures, 
 some were men very godly learned in the laws of the Most Highest, 
 and professoures of ye same. So oft as I was in their companye, 
 me thoughte I was clean delivered from Egypte and quietly placed 
 in the newe gloriouse Jerusalem, which is descrybed in the revela- 
 cion of blessed John, so swete a thing is it to be in the company of 
 godly learned men. 
 
 Euse. Travelled you into none other countrey afterwarde ? 
 
 Phile. While I was trayning up of youth, and fashionyng their 
 minds unto true godlynesse in this countreye, beholde, unlooked for, 
 were letters sent unto me from my moste deare mother, in the 
 whych she requyred me to returne into my native countrey, and 
 to be a staffe of her old age, forasmuch as my father-in-lawe was 
 departed from thys vale of myserye. In consyderyng my duetye, 
 and the honoure whych I owe unto her by the manifeste com- 
 mandemente of God, immediatelye after, not wythoute the frendly 
 consente of my wel wyllers departed from Warwikeshere, and with 
 all haste repaired home." 
 
 As to its warlike tendencies, even at other times than " The King 
 Maker's," we read much. In Drayton's Polyolbion, Book xiii., there 
 appears — 
 
 " Brave Warwick, that abroad so long advanced her ' Bear,' 
 By her illustrious earls renowned everywhere, 
 Above her neighbouring shires which always bore her head." 
 
 In Fuller's Worthies, written some time before being printed 
 by his son in 1662, he speaks of the various counties and their 
 distinguished men. 
 
 His notice of Shakspere appears in Chapter v. 
 
 He says that John Kous died in 1491, who had been born in War- 
 wick, educated at Oxford, and had retired to write his Antiquities to 
 Guy's Cliff, near Warwick. " A most delicious place, so that a man 
 in many miles' riding cannot meet so much variety as one furlong 
 doth afford. A steep rock full of caves, in the Bowels thereof washed 
 at the bottom with a Christall River, besides so many clear springs on 
 the side thereof, all overshadowed with a stately grove, so that an
 
 APPENDIX. 231 
 
 ordinary Fancy may here find to itself Helicon, Parnassus, and 
 whatnot?" . . . 
 
 " Michael Drayton was born at Athelstan, within a few miles of 
 William Shakespeare, his countryman, and buried within a fewer 
 paces of Jeoffrey Chaucer and Edmund Spenser in Westminster 
 Abbey." 
 
 He says in Song 13, p. 213 :— 
 
 " My native country, 
 If there be virtue yet remaining in thy earth, 
 Or any good of thine thou breathest into my birth, 
 Accept it as thine own, while now I sing of thee, 
 Of all thy later brood th' unworthiest though I be." 
 
 Dugdale, author of the Antiquities of Warwick, was also a War- 
 wickshire man. 
 
 Note 2. — Stratford. 
 
 The division between Arden and Feldon, by the Avon, in the 
 county of Warwick, is well expressed by Shakspere in King Lear. 
 Stratford had been called so from being the " ford" on the great 
 street from Henley-in-Arden to London. Three hundred years 
 before the Conquest, Stratford was a lordship belonging to the 
 bishopric of Worcester. Two hundred years before the Conquest 
 it had a bishop of its own. Early in the sixteenth century it had 
 come into the possession of the Earls of Warwick, and was incor- 
 porated in 1553. Sir Hugh Clopton had built a handsome bridge, 
 which brought much trade to the town. It had a yearly fair, last- 
 ing three days, and dedicated to the Holy Trinity. The Rother 
 Market, or cattle-market, was an important feature in Stratford 
 life, as most of the wealthier families engaged in farming. Speede's 
 County Map of England was published in 1610. An order is extant, 
 dated 1607, requesting all gentlemen and other residents in the 
 county to assist him in his work. He draws the relative size and 
 importance of the towns and villages by a condensed little group of 
 buildings ; and in spite of scorn thrown now at " the peasant village 
 of Stratford," it is sketched the same size as Warwick, and second 
 only to Coventry in the county. 
 
 The parish of old Stratford was fifteen miles in circumference, and 
 included Shottery, Clopton, Little Wilmcote, &c. It had a Holy 
 Guild, the history of which can be found in Dugdale and French ; 
 their "College" had been well endowed, and up to 1535 supported 
 four priests at £5, 6s. 8d., and a schoolmaster at ^io salary; so 
 education was then honoured. At the dissolution of "the Holy
 
 232 APPENDIX. 
 
 Guild " the town received the possessions together with the great 
 tithes, to maintain a vicar, a curate, and a schoolmaster, to pay 
 the almspeople, and repair the chapel, bridge, and other public 
 buildings. Half of these tithes Shakspere bought at the suggestion 
 of Abraham Sturley. 
 
 The Grammar-school had been founded by the Rev. Mr. Jolyffe 
 in Henry VI. 's reign, but had got into difficulties in the reign of 
 Henry VIII., which may account for the poor education of Shak- 
 spere's father. But the charter of Edward VI. guaranteed the 
 schoolmaster an annual stipend of ,£20 a year and a free house, 
 at a time when ^10 was the ordinary salary. Thomas Hunt was 
 the schoolmaster in Shakspere's time. 
 
 The disputes among the stationers of the time show that school- 
 books were the most profitable patents at that time, and that in 
 one case Roger Ward had infringed Day's patent "by printing 
 10,000 copies of the ABC, with the little Catechism appointed 
 by her Highness' injunction for the instruction of children, with 
 the patentee's name and trade-mark thereon, and sent them down 
 to sell in the country." Professor Baynes gives the list of the 
 books ordinarily used at the time in grammar-schools. For young 
 children there were this ABC, Catechism, Psalter, New Testament, 
 and Book of Common Prayer, in English. 
 
 The 1st form had the Accidence and Sentential Pueriles. 
 
 2nd. -Lily's Grammar, Cato's Maxims, Pueriles Confabulatiuncula?, 
 Colloquies of Corderius. 
 
 3rd. Grammar, Latin Testament, JEsop's Fables, Dialogues of 
 Castilio and Eclogues of Mantuanus, Colloquies of Helvicus. 
 
 4th. Testament, Grammar, Elements of Rhetoric, Terence, 
 Selected Epistles of Cicero, Ovid's de Tristibus and Metamorphoses, 
 and Buchanan's Psalms. 
 
 5th. In addition to Rhetoric, Livy's Orations, Justin, Cassar, 
 Florus, Colloquies of Erasmus, and Virgil. 
 
 6th. Horace, Juvenal, Persius, Lucan, Plautus, Martial, Cicero's 
 Orations, and Seneca's Tragedies. 
 
 A record of these as the usual books was drawn up by the Free 
 Grammar-School of St. Bees in Cumberland in 1583. 
 
 Brinsley, headmaster of Ashby-de-la-Zouche, 1612, and Charles 
 Hoole (born 1610), describe the master's method. Hoole suggests 
 Butler's Rhetorick or Talaeus's Rhetorick, " Let them repeat part of 
 the Elementa Rhetorica every Thursday." Alciat's Emblem-book 
 was much used, and many schoolmasters preferred the Eclogues of 
 Eaptista Mantuanus to Virgil. It had many editions and one 
 translation by Shakspere's time. He makes Holofernes speak of 
 them (Love's Labour's Lout). In the Taming of the Shrew the heroic 
 epistle from Penelope to Ulysses from Ovid is construed. " Titania "
 
 APPENDIX. 233 
 
 is taken from Ovid, meaning one of the Titans ; also Autolycus, as a 
 name, comes direct from Ovid. A study of Professor Baynes' interest- 
 ing articles suggests how much Latin and Greek the poet ought to 
 have known, to have induced Ben Jonson's relative judgment of him. 
 The Kev. Mr. Ward was made Vicar of Stratford in 1662, and he 
 states that fever prevailed much after the stream of Avon over- 
 flowed its banks— probably a low typhoid form, which prostrated 
 Shakspere. 
 
 Note 3. — John Shakspere. 
 
 Richard Shakspere, farmer at Snitterfield, held 
 from Robert Arden, Mary's father, 
 I 
 
 I I I 
 
 Thomas. John, m. Mary Arden. Henry. 
 
 I 
 William Shakspere, &c. 
 
 The immediate family of Richard has not been distinguished. 
 Many of the name of Shakspere are found on the list of the brothers 
 and sisters of the Guild of St. Anna at Knoll, from 1407 till the 
 dissolution of the fraternity in 1535, and these have the common 
 names of the family — Joan, Thomas, Bichard, Isabella, Alice, 
 William. 
 
 Dugdale (ed. 1656) said "that a multitude of persons, whereof 
 most were of good quality, nay, some of the great nobility in those 
 days, had admittance of this guild." 
 
 In 28 Henry VIIL, 1537, Thomas, Richard, and William Shakspere 
 were mentioned as in the King's service ; but the definite relation- 
 ship has not yet been discovered. 
 
 Application for his coat of arms states that his antecessors ren- 
 dered valiant service to Henry VII., probably at Bosworth. 
 
 But in Stratford, where John came in 155 1, his own tenements, 
 his wife's property, and his own capabilities, soon after his settle- 
 ment, let him take a leading place in its life, until the losses in 
 Shakspere's youth made him keep from going either to the Halls or 
 the Church. He was elected Ale-taster, 1557; Constable, 1558; 
 Chamberlain, 1560; Alderman, 1565; High Bailiff, 156S ; Chief 
 Alderman, 1571 till 15S6. 
 
 Note 4. — Mary Arden. 
 It is well to remember the various family connections.
 
 2.34 
 
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 APPENDIX. 235 
 
 In Drummond's Noble British Families it is noted '"that there are 
 few families in Europe, and fewer still in Britain, that can boast of 
 a descent in uninterrupted male line so antient as this of Arden." 
 
 In Robert Arden's will Mary is mentioned first, and is to receive 
 £6, 13s. 4d. before anything else is divided. This was probably 
 money for wedding-clothes, already allowed to her married sisters. 
 She was also to receive all the land at Wilmecote called Asbies. 
 The property was to be divided into seven parts ; but as Mary 
 had the sixth part of the interest in Snitterfield, it is probable that 
 her sister Joyce had died, as there is no future mention of her. 
 Alice and Mary are made executors of the will, in preference to their 
 stepmother and married sisters. Everything points to Mary being 
 the most capable of the family. As there is no further mention of 
 Alice, it is probable that Mary also inherited her share, as some 
 papers show her to have been possessed of another property at 
 Aston Cantlowe. 
 
 To his wife Robert Arden also left £6, 13s. 4d. if she allowed his 
 daughter Ales to enjoy half his copyhold in Wilmecote during the 
 time of her widowhood ; and if she did not, then she was to have 
 nothing but her jointure in Snitterfield. This stepmother married 
 Robert Arden in 1550; he died shortly after. 
 
 She died in 1580, and her will was proved 1581. She left nothing 
 to any of the Ardens, but Snitterfield reverted to them, though the 
 rights in it had been bought up by the Webbes. The half-copyhold 
 in Wilmecote also probably reverted to the family — apparently to 
 Mary through Alice, as by some deeds she is shown to have been 
 possessed of another property in Aston Cantlowe, also sacrificed 
 to meet her husband's pressing wants. — French's Genealogica Shake- 
 spcarcana. 
 
 Note 5. — Asbies and Snitterfield. 
 
 In 1579 Mary Shakspere and her husband sold the reversion of 
 the share in Snitterfield which would have come to her on the death 
 of her stepmother. This was bought by Robert Webbe, to which 
 family the stepmother belonged, and it was the sixth, not the 
 seventh part. 
 
 The property of Asbies in Wilmecote had been mortgaged to Lam- 
 bert, Mary's brother-in-law, or rather John and Mary Shakspere 
 had borrowed £40 on it from him. He had drawn the income of it 
 for three or four years, and they offered to pay back the £40 and 
 free it. He refused to do this until other sums due to him from 
 John Shakspere were paid. Apparently he had the title-deeds, and
 
 236 A PPENDIX. 
 
 refused to part with them; though it is evident there was some 
 wrong somewhere. Mary's sixth share of Snitterfield, which (as a 
 whole) was of less value than Asbies, sold for ,£40. They agreed in 
 1587 to lend them ^20 more on it. 
 
 When Shakspere made some money, his first effort, in 1597, was 
 to regain possession of Asbies, proved by a case heard before Sir 
 Thomas Egerton ; but apparently the arrangements had been too 
 loose and verbal ; his uncle had died ; his cousin was in possession ; 
 and we hear no more of Asbies, or even of a decree. See French's 
 Genealogica Shake spear eana. 
 
 Note 6. — Theatres of London. 
 
 "Early in Elizabeth's reign, the established players of London 
 began to act in temporary theatres in the yards of inns." 
 
 In the time of Shakspere were seven theatres ; three private 
 houses — viz., Blackfriars, Whitefriars, the Cockpit or Phcenix in 
 Drury Lane ; and four public theatres. The Globe on the Bank 
 Side ; the Curtain in Shoreditch ; the Ked Bull at the upper end 
 of St. John Street ; and the Fortune in Whitecross Street (Wal- 
 dron's Shaksperean 3Iiscellan)/). 
 
 It is the fashion to decry these theatres as rude, after Sir Henry 
 Wotton's manner, but the papers of De Witt, who had visited 
 London in 1596, say that by that time they were the finest he 
 had seen ; that they were able to accommodate 3000 spectators, 
 and he gives particulars of their decoration. He mentions the Rose 
 theatre, the Globe, and the Swan, the Theatre founded 1576, and 
 the Curtain, 1577, north of Bishopsgate. The drawing of the Swan 
 is circular, in three tiers ; the upper called Porticus ; the second, 
 Sedilia ; the third, Orchestra ; the Mimorum Aedes, behind the 
 stage ; and the whole " planetries sive arena " open. " Ex observa- 
 tionibus Londinensibus Johannis de Witt. Nach einer in Utrecht 
 befindlichen Handzeichnung vom Jahre 1596, edited by Karl 
 Theodor Gaedertz." The effect of theatrical performance on habits 
 and education is well illustrated in Dekkar's Gul's Hornbook, 1609. 
 
 Chap. vi. shows " How a young gallant should behave himself in 
 a play-house." 
 
 "The theatre is your Poet's Eoyal Exchange, on which their 
 muses (they are now turned to merchants) meeting, barter away 
 that light commodity of words, for a lighter ware than words, 
 Plaudities and the Breath of the Great Beast, which (like the 
 threatening of two cowards), vanish all into the aire. Seat your-
 
 APPENDIX. 237 
 
 self on the very rushes where the Commedy is to dance. For do but 
 cast up a reckoning what large cornrnings in are pursed up by sitting 
 on the stage, first a conspicuous eminence is gotten, by which 
 means the best and most essentiall parts of a gallant (good cloaths 
 and a proportionable legge, white hands, the Persian lock, and a 
 tolerable beard) are perfectly revealed. By sitting on the stage you 
 have a signed patent to engross the whole commodity of censure, 
 may lawfully presume to be a girder, stand at the helme to steere 
 the passage of scenes, yet no man shall once offer to hinder you 
 from obtaining the title of an insolent over-weening coxcombe. 
 
 " By sitting on the stage you may (without travelling for it) at the 
 very next doore aske whose play it is ; and by that Quest of Inquiry, 
 the Law warrants you to avoid much mistaking : if you know not 
 ye Author, you may raile against him ; and peradventure so behave 
 yourselfe, that you may enforce the Author to know you. . . . By 
 spreading your body on the stage, and by being a Justice in examin- 
 ing of plaies, you shall put yourselfe into such true scamical 
 authority, that some Poet shall not dare to present his Muse rudely 
 upon your eyes, without having first unmaskt her, rifled her, and 
 discovered all her bare and most mysticall parts before you at a 
 taverne, when you most Knightly shall for his paines pay for both 
 the suppers. 
 
 " By sitting on the stage you may (with small cost) purchase the 
 deere acquaintance of the boyes ; have a good stool for sixpence ; 
 at any time know what particular part any of the infants present ; 
 get your match lighted, examine the play-suits lace, and perhaps 
 win wagers upon laying 'tis copper, &c. And to conclude, of what 
 stamp soever you be, current or counterfeit, the Stage, like time, 
 will bring you to most perfect light, and lay you open : neither are 
 you to be hunted from thence, though the scarecrows in the yard 
 hoot at you, hisse at you, spit at you, yea, throw dust even in your 
 teeth: 'tis most gentlemanlike patience to endure all this, and to 
 laugh at the silly animals : but if the Rabble, with a full throat cry, 
 Away with the foole, you were worse than a madman to tarry by it ; 
 for the gentleman and the fool should never sit on the stage. 
 
 " Present not yourself on the Stage (especially at a new Play) until 
 the quaking Prologue hath (by rubbing) got culor into his cheekes, 
 and is ready to give the trumpets their Cue, that hees upon point to 
 enter : for then it is time, as though you were one of the properties, 
 or that you dropt out of the hangings, to creepe from behind the 
 Arras, with your Tripos or three-footed stoole in one hand, and a 
 Teston mounted betweene a forefinger and a thumbe in the other ; 
 for if you should bestowe your person upon the vulgar when 
 the house is but half-fulle, your apparell is quite eaten up, 
 the fashion lost, and the proportion of your body in more danger
 
 238 APPENDIX. 
 
 to be devoured than if it were served up in the Counter amongst 
 the Poultry : avoid that as you ■would the Bastome. It shall 
 crown you with rich commendation, to laugh aloud in the 
 middest of the most serious and saddest scene of the terriblest 
 Tragedy ; and to let that clapper (your tongue) be tost so high that 
 all the House may ring of it : your Lords use it : your Knights are apes 
 to the Lords, and do so too ; your Inne-a-court-man is Zany to the 
 Knights, and (mary very scurvily) comes likewise limping after it ; 
 bee thou a beagle to them all, and never lieve snuffing till you have 
 scented them ; for by talking and laughing (like a ploughman in a 
 Morris) you heap Pelion upon Ossa, glory upon glory : As first, all 
 the eyes in the galleries will leave walking after the Players and 
 onely follow you ; the simplest dolt in the house snatches up your 
 name, and when he meetes you in the streete, or that you fall into 
 his hands in the middle of a watch, his word shall be taken for you : 
 heele cry, Hees such a gallant, and you passe. Secondly, you publish 
 your temperance to the world, in that you seeme not to resort thither 
 to taste vaine pleasures with a hungry appetite ; but onely as a 
 Gentleman to spende a foolish houre or two, because you can doe 
 nothing else. Thirdly, you mightily disrelish the Audience, and 
 disgrace the Author. Marry, you take up (though it be at the worst 
 hand) a strong opinion of your owne judgment, and inforce the 
 Poet to take pity of your weaknesse, and by some dedicated sonnet, 
 to bring you into a better paradice, onely to stop your mouth. Pro- 
 vide yourselfe a lodging by the Waterside ; ... it adds a kind of 
 state to you to be carried from thence to the stairs of your Play- 
 house ; hate a sculler (remember that) worse than to be acquainted 
 with one o' the Scullery. No, your Oares are your only sea-crabs. . . . 
 Before the Play begins, fall to cardes. . . . Now, sir, if the writer be 
 a fellow that hath either epigrammed you, or hath had a flirt at 
 your mistress, or hath brought either your feather, or your red- 
 beard, or your little legs &c. on the stage, you shall disgrace him 
 worse then by tossing him in a blancket, or giving him the Bastinado 
 in a Taverne; if, in the middle of his play (bee it Pastoral or Comedy, 
 Morall or Tragedie) you rise with a screwed and discontented face 
 from your stoole to be gone ; no matter whether the Scenes be good 
 or no ; the better they are, the worse do you distaste them ; and 
 beeing on your feete, sneake not away like a cowarde, but salute all 
 your gentle acquaintances that are sprede either on the rushes, or 
 on stooles about you, and draw what troope you can from the stage 
 after you ; the Mimickes are beholden to you, for allowing them 
 elbow roome ; their Poet cries, perhaps, a pox go with you, but care 
 not for that, theres no musick without frets. 
 
 " Mary, if either the company or the indisposition of the weather 
 binde you to sit it out, my counsell is then that you turn plain Ape, 
 

 
 APPENDIX. 239 
 
 take up a rushe, and tickle the earnest eares of your fellow gallants, 
 to make other fooles fall a laughing ; mewe at passionate speeches, 
 blare at merrie, finde faulte with the musicke, whew at the chil- 
 dren's action, whistle at the songs, and above all curse the Sharers, 
 that whereas the same day you had bestowed forty shillings on an 
 embroidered felt and feather (Scotch fashion) for your mistris in the 
 Court, within two houres after you encounter with the very same 
 block on the stage, when the Haberdasher swore to you the impres- 
 sion was extant but that morning. 
 
 "To conclude, hoord up the finest play-scraps you can get upon 
 which your leane witte may most savourly feede, for want of other 
 stuffe, when the Arcadian and Euphuis'd gentlewomen have their 
 tongues sharpened to set on you ; that quality (next to your shittle- 
 cocke) is the only furniture to a courtier that is but a new beginner 
 and is but in his A.B.C of complement." 
 
 The law-courts gave them motives for domestic drama, and were 
 well attended by dramatists ; and we can see from Heywood's Pro- 
 logue the various kind of plays that must have come before Shak- 
 spere at times to judge. 
 
 " To give content to this most curious age 
 The gods themselves we've brought down to the stage, 
 And figured them in planets ; made even Hell 
 Deliver up the Furies, by no spell 
 Saving the Muses' rapture. Further we 
 Have trafficked by their help, no history 
 We've left unrifled ; our pens have been dipped 
 As well in opening each hid manuscript 
 As tracts more vulgar, whether read or sung 
 In our domestic or more foreign tongue. 
 Of fairy elves, nymphs of the sea or land, 
 The lawns and groves, no number can be scanned 
 Which we've not given feet to ; nay, 'tis known 
 That when our chronicles have barren grown 
 Of story, we have all invention stretched, 
 Dived low as to the centre, and then reached 
 Unto the Primum Mobile above, 
 Nor 'scaped things intermediate, for your loTe." 
 
 Note 7. — Gerard. 
 
 At this time Gerard lived in Holburn, and was studying the 
 natures and habitats of plants with reverent love. He tried to
 
 240 APPENDIX. 
 
 plant them in his spacious garden, and records those that thrive 
 and those that do not. He must have had a large garden, as a large 
 proportion of the plants of temperate climates he mentions as grow- 
 ing there. His friends sent him news of foreign and far-away 
 plants ; he himself is always making excursions in the neighbour- 
 hood of London, and recording those he found. I went through 
 his Ilistorie of Plants to see what flowers Shakspere would be 
 likely to find when he took the country strolls he must have loved, 
 to Hampstead Heath on the north, and Gipsy Hill and Norwood 
 on the south. He put forth his Ilistorie of Plants, " From my 
 house in Holburne in the Suburbs of London. John Gerard, 
 
 I597-" 
 
 The woods by Southfleete, near Gravesend, are a rich treasury : 
 Buckthorne, Wild Hempe, Pimpernel, Wild Thyme, Starwort, Speed- 
 well or Fluellen, Herbe Ivy, Canterbury Bells, Mullett, Blue English 
 Harebells, Mustard, Rocket, Tway blade, Venus' Looking-Glass, the 
 Butterfly Orchis, Sciatica cresses, Trichomanes and other ferns, Sea- 
 Lavender, Sea Starwort, grow there. 
 
 Hampstead Heath produced also most of these plants, and the 
 Royal Fern, Rough Spleenwort, Carduus Benedictus or Blessed 
 Thistle, singular good against all poisons, ulcers, forgetfulness, 
 deafness. 
 
 Adder's Tongue groweth in a meadow by the Preaching Spittle, 
 adjoining to London. 
 
 The Arrowheads or Water Archers "doe grow in the watery 
 ditches by Saint George his Field, neere unto London ; and in the 
 Tower ditche at London." 
 
 The Harteshorne plantains grow in barren plains and sandy 
 grounds, as in Tonthill fielde, near unto Westminster. 
 
 Willow Herbe grows in the meadows as you go from Lambeth to 
 Battersey, near London. A rare Orchis in a village near London 
 called Stepney. 
 
 "Moneywort " found right against the Queen's Palace of White- 
 hall. 
 
 Pennyroyal grows in the common near London called Mile's end. 
 
 Wild Clarie grows in the fields of Holburne neere unto Graies 
 Inne, and at the ende of Chelsey next to London. 
 
 Mullein grows in Blackheath. Saxifrage groweth in the great 
 field of Islington. Vervaine Mallowe groweth by the ditch-sides on 
 the left hand of the place of execution by London, called Tyborne ; 
 likewise among the bushes and hedges as you go from London to a 
 bathing-place called the old Forde ; and in the bushes as you go to 
 Hackney, a village by London in the closes next the towne. 
 
 •' The second kind of Crowfoot (Ranunculus surrectis cauliculis) 
 is like unto the precedent, saving that his leaves are fatter, thicker, 

 
 APPENDIX. ■ 241 
 
 and greener, and his small twiggie stalks stand upright ; of which 
 kinde it chanced that walking in the field next unto the Theatre by 
 London, in company of a worshipful merchant of London named 
 Master Nicholas Seton, I founde one of this kinde there with double 
 flowers, which before that time I had not seen." 
 
 Note 8. — Field and Vautrollier. 
 From Stationers Registers. 
 
 J. Vautrollier became a freeman on 2d October 1564. 
 
 A note of J. Vautrolliers Priviledges : — 
 
 8th July 1578. — He hath one privilege granted to Ludovik Lloid 
 on 15 Anno Elizabeth for viij yeres, of Plutarch de vitis imperatorum 
 translated. He hath another priviledge for 10 years of these 2 
 bookes following Gia. Silva, Nor. Giordina, Cosmographica Con- 
 tinuato de B. Sylva. — 18 April 1573. 
 
 Item ,, Paras elegantes linguas Latins phrases olim ab Aldo 
 Manutio Paulo Alio conscripts iam nero in ordinem alphabeticum 
 redacts et in Anglicum sermonem Conversse. 
 
 Item ,, Another priviledge for x. yeres of Novum Testamentum 
 Bezs cum annotationibus et sive annotationibus. 
 ' Sumrns Scripturze thesaurus in locos communus digestus ex 
 Augustine Marlorati adversariis Guglielmi Feuquercei Opera in 
 Tabulas. 
 
 Biblia Latina ex versione Sancti Paginal. 
 
 Synonymorum sylva Pelegronis ex Germania in Latium conversa. 
 
 Ovidii Nasonis Opera Omnia. 
 
 Ciceronis Opera omnia ex Lambini et doctissimorum virorum 
 annotationibus simul et separatim. 
 
 Dialectica Rami illustrata per Makilmanum. 
 
 " He hath libertie to retain in the printing of these bookes above 
 mentioned 6 Frenchmen or Dutchmen, or such like." 
 
 Thomas Vautrollier, 1578. — Aright comfortable treatise contain- 
 ing xiij. poyntes of Consolation for them that labour and are laden, 
 iiij d and a copie. 
 
 1579. — Geffrey Fenton's Translation of ye History of Guicciardini 
 of the Low Countries. " The Latin in 1567." 
 
 A Boke in English called Plutarch's Lives (i.e., from the French 
 of Amyott, Englished by Sir Thomas North. Folio). 
 
 Luther's Sermons in English. 
 
 Luther's Consolations in English.
 
 242 APPENDIX. 
 
 Eusebius' Historie in English. 
 
 ioth August 1579. — Richard Feilde, sonne of Henry Fielde of 
 Stratford upon Avon in the county of Warwick, Tanner, Hath put 
 himself Apprentis to George Byshop, citizen and Stationer of 
 London for vij yeres from Michaelmas next. ij s . vi d . 
 
 29th Sept. 1579. — It is agreed yat this Apprentis shall serve ye 
 first vj yeres of his Apprentiseship with ye said Vautrollicr tolearnc 
 ye arte of printing and ye vij* yere with ye said Byshop. 
 
 Richard Feild became a freeman 6th February 1587. 
 
 1 8th Sept. — Thomas Vautrollier. Licensed unto him under the 
 handes of the bishop of London and both the Wardens. " Claudii a 
 Sanctu vinculo de pronunciatione lingua e galleiaa libri duo." iiij d . 
 
 15th Jan. 1582. — Thomas Vautrollier. Receaved of him for his 
 licence for printing these ij books, viz., paraphrases, aliquot 
 psalmorum Davidis, Carmina heroica, Scipio Gentilis aucthore. 
 And Le Jardin de Vertu et bonnes moeurs par J. B. gentlehomme 
 (i.e. Jacques Bellot) Cadomois xij d and copies. 
 
 Thomas Vautrollier, 20th Feb. 1587. —La Main Chretienne aux 
 touches. 
 
 1587. — The treasons of the Scottish Queen, sentence at Fotherin- 
 gay. A poem intituled Sir William Herbertes Sidney. An excellent 
 ditty of general rejoicing for cutting off of the Scotch Queen. 
 
 From the publications themselves we know that Vautrollier 
 published : — 
 
 The Institution of the Christian Religion, written in Latin by Mr. 
 John Calvine, and translated into English by Thomas Norton, 1578. 
 
 A Treatise on French Verbs. A most easie, perfect, and absolute 
 way to learn the French tongue, 1581. 
 
 An Italian Grammar, written in Latin by M. Scipio Lentulo, and 
 turned into English by Henry Grantham, 1578 and 15S7. 
 
 Claude de Sainliens, the French Littleton, &c. Campo di Fior, or 
 else the fiourie field of foure languages, for the furtherance of the 
 learners in the Latine, French, English, but chiefly of the Italian 
 tongues, 1583. 
 
 An Astrological Catechism, Englished by Turner. Leowitz. 
 
 A Brief Introduction to Music. Collected by Paul de la Motte, a 
 Frenchman. Licensed. London, 8vo, 1574. 
 
 De Beau Chesne. Translated by John Baildon. 
 
 A book containing divers sorts of hands, etc. 
 
 In Herbert's Typographical Antiquities there is another list of 
 Vautrollier's publications. 
 
 Discursus Cantiones ; qua? ab argumento sacra vocantur quinque 
 et sex partuum. Autoribus Thomas Tallisio et Gulielmo Birdo. 
 Cum privilegio. London, oblong 4to, 1575. 
 
 Gaspard de Coligny, Admiral of France. The Lyfe of the most
 
 APPENDIX. 243 
 
 godly, valeant, and noble capteine and rnaintener of the trew 
 Christian Religion in France, &c. 
 
 Field, we saw, became a freeman in 15S7, and on Vautrollier's 
 death soon after, married his widow and succeeded him. 
 
 24th Dec. 15S8. — Richard Feilde entred for his copie a booke in 
 French intituled Le politique reforms', qui est une apologie pour 
 les Princes Reformez contre les Calomnies de la Ligue. Entered 
 for his copie the same booke, being translated into English. 
 
 26th May 1589. — Master Feild entered for his copie, as well in 
 French as English, The Declarations of the Frenche Kinge, and the 
 Kinge of Navarre, upon the truce concluded between yer Majesties 
 together with the King of Navarre's Declaration at his passage 
 over the Ryver of Loire ; Master Hartwell's hand being to these 
 copies. xii d . 
 
 Richard Ffield, 2nd June, David's Faith and Repentance. Daniell, 
 expounde by Scriptures in Hebrue, Greeke, and English. 
 
 9th June. — Vray Discours sur la Diffaicte des Due D'Aumalle et 
 Sieur de Battagny avec leurs troupes, par le Due de Longueville et 
 autres seigneurs, &c. 
 
 Lettre d'un gentilhomme de Beausse a un sien aux Bourgeois de 
 Paris. Lettre du Roy de Navarre a Messieurs d' Orleans Du 22 Maij 
 1589, a Banquenay. xvj d . 
 
 The following book was entered shortly, that I have expanded 
 from the title 1589: — 
 
 Puttenham's Arte of English Poesie. Contrived into three Bookes ; 
 the first of Poets and Poesie, the second of Proportion, the third of 
 Ornament. Dedicated by Puttenham to the Queen, and by Field 
 to Lord Burleigh. It expresses strong objection to rhymed plays. 
 and teaches that vice should be reproved in comedy. 
 
 Richard Ffeild, 16th June 16S9. — Entred for his copie to be 
 prynted in Frenche and Englisshe a booke entituled Discours 
 brief mais tressolide, monstrant clairement qu'il est loisible, hon- 
 neste, utile et necessaire au Roy de s'allier au Roy de Navarre. 
 
 7th August 1589. — Le vray Agnus Dei pour desarmer le peuple 
 Frangois Escrit pour Le Roy tres chrestien Henrie iij Roy de Fraunce 
 et de Pologne sur le point de son Massacre. Dedie au Roy tres- 
 chrestien Henry iiijme Roy de Navarre. 
 
 Richard Feild. — A booke intituled The furious, translated by 
 James the Sixte, Kinge of Scotland, with the " Lepanto " of the 
 same Kinge. 
 
 1st Dec. 15S9. — A briefe discourse of the Spanishe State, with a 
 Dyalogue intituled Philobasites. 
 
 13th March 1590. — The Method of Phisicke. Phillip Barroughe 
 aucthore. 
 
 Q
 
 244 APPENDIX. 
 
 16th May 1590. — A sovereigne salve for a sicke soule, teachings 
 the righte use of a patient bearinge the crosse. 
 
 1 6th May 1590.— Richard Field: A brief discourse dialoge wyse 
 shewinge how false and dangerous their reportes are which affirme the 
 Spanyardes intendid invasion is for reestablishment of the liomishe 
 Religion ; her Majesties alliance with the Netherlands, &c, by Sir 
 Francis Drake's enterprise three years past into the West Indies. 
 
 25th June.— Allowed unto him for his copie. The French Lyttle- 
 ton, sette forthe by Holiband, and printed by Vautrollier. 
 
 Allowed also unto him. 
 
 The Treatise of Christian Righteousness, which was Thomas 
 Vautrollier's copie. 
 
 Stat. Reg. 7 Feb. 1 591. —Jasper Field, son of Henry Feild of 
 Statford upon Avon, in the County of Warwick, Tanner, hath put 
 himself e an apprentice to Richard Feild, citizen and stationer of 
 London for seven yeres from the date hereof (7 Feb. 1591) ij s . vid. 
 
 26th February 1591. — A book entituled John Harington's Orlando 
 Furioso of Ludovico Ariosto. 
 
 6th Dec. 1 59 1. —Parti prima Delle Reni Dimonstrationi et precettd 
 utilissimi de Diversi propositi morali politici et Iconomisi Da 
 Petruccio Ubaldino Cittadini Fiorentino. 
 
 1st July 1592. — A booke entituled The Frenche Alphabet, to- 
 gether with the treasure of the French tonge. 
 
 5th Feb. 1593. — A brief e discourse of man's transgression and of 
 his Redemption by Christ, with a particular survey of Romysch 
 religion and Rome itself. 
 
 5th March 1593.— A brief apologie of certain new invengons, com- 
 piled by Master H. Plot. 
 
 (Walter Bigg's : " A summary and true discourse of Sir F. Drake's 
 West Indian Voyage," &c. 
 
 Thomas Cogan : " The haven of health, chiefly made for the use 
 of students." 
 
 David Hume of Godscroft : " Daphnis-Amarylis.") 
 
 1 8th April 1593. — Richard Field entered for his copie under the 
 handes of the Archbishop of Canterbury and Master Warden 
 Stirrup, a booke intituled Venus and Adonis. v d . 
 
 (Assigned over to Master Harrison, senior, 25th June.) 
 
 nth Dec. 1593. — Entered for his copye a booke intituled The 
 Pearle of Practise or Practisers Pearle of Phisick and Chirurgie. 
 
 31st Dec. — A discription of the properties of all the principalleste 
 mineralles. 
 
 Richard Ffeilde, 14th January 1594.— Assigned unto him the 
 printing of Tullies Orations in i6mo for the Companye, and he to 
 allowe upon every impression vj J in the pound to the use of the 
 poore of the Company, according to the order in yat behalf. Mem.
 
 APPENDIX. 245 
 
 That this entrance is onely of Tullies urations, in decimo sexto in 
 3 volumes. 
 
 Richard Ffeilde assigned unto him in like sort the printing of 
 Tully's Offices in decimo sexto only. Allowing vi d in the pound 
 uppon every impression, to the use of the poore. 
 
 1st May 1594. — Master Feilde, The Holy Historie of our Lord and 
 Saviour Jesus Christus, Nativitie, Life, Acts, Miracles, Doctrine, 
 Deathe, Passion, Resurrection, and Ascension, gathered into English 
 meeter by R. H. Holland, Master of Artes. 
 
 Richard Field, 7th May 1594. — Assigned over to him for his copye 
 from Master Bonham Norton, by consent of a court holden this 
 day, The history of Guicciardini, conteyning the warres of Italy, 
 &c. , and also the argumentes with a table, &c, reduced into English 
 by Geoffrey Fenton. 
 
 ,, ,, Assigned unto him from Master Harrison th' elder 
 (Lyacropedius de conscribendis epistolis). 
 
 25th June 1594. — Master Harrison, senior, assigned over unto 
 him from Richard Field in open court holden this day, a book 
 called Venus and Adonis, the which was before entered to Richard 
 Field. 
 
 Master Harrison, senior, and Richard Field, a booke entituled 
 Phrases Manutii. — 2 Dec. 1594. 
 
 Observations on the Arte of English Poesie, by Thomas Campion, 
 1594. (1602. Field, Thoma Campiona. Poema.) 
 
 30th Oct. 1596. — Richard Fielde. Entered for his copy intituled 
 A newe discourse of a stale subject called The Metamorphosis of 
 Ajax, with the Anatomy and Apologie of the same, wrytten by 
 Mysacmos to his frend and Cozen Philostilpnos. 
 
 6th March 1599. — Richard Feilde. The Sacred Shield of all 
 Christian Souldyours, &c. 
 
 Richard Field payd x.lb. for exemption from Rentership on 26th 
 March 1604. 
 
 Master Field, Warden, 1605. 
 
 (Saluste du Bartas. " The Divine Weeks and Works." 
 
 Giordano de Bruno's Philosophy. 
 
 Cicero's Orations (ad imprimendum solum). 
 
 Timothy Bright. A Treatise on Melancholy, containing the causes 
 thereof, and reasons of the strange effects it worketh in our minds 
 and bodies. 1586. 
 
 Jacques Bellot. Le Jardin de Vertus et bonnes mceurs. 
 
 Many editions of the Bible. Sir Thomas Chaloner De Rep. Anglo- 
 rum instauranda Libri Decern.)
 
 246 APPENDIX. 
 
 Note 9. — Suakspere's Coat of Arms. 
 
 0£ the grant of arms to John Shakspere, 1596, two drafts are 
 preserved in the College of Arms, MS. Vincent, 157, Art. 23 and 
 Art. 24, stating that the reasons that John Shakspere should bear a 
 coat of arms and hand it down to posterity are these : — " His parents 
 and late antecessors were advanced by King Henry VII. for valiant 
 services ; that they continued in good reputation and credit in the 
 same parts ; that John had married Mary, daughter and co-heir of 
 Robert Arden of Wilmcote, in the said county, esquire." William 
 Dethick, Garter king-of-arms, granted a shield or cote of arms, viz., 
 Gould on a bend sables, a speare of the first, steeled argent ; and 
 for his crest or cognizance a falcon, his wings displayed argent, 
 standing on a wrethe of his coullers, supporting a speare, gould set 
 upon a helmett with mantelles and tasselles as hath been accus- 
 tomed." His motto, "Non sans droict." 
 
 There were memoranda below this draft. " This John showeth 
 a patierne thereof under the Clarent Cooke's hand in paper xx. 
 yeares past. Had been Q. officer and cheffe of the towne (Justice 
 of the Peace), was a Bay life of Stratford on Avon, xx. or xxi. yeares 
 past. That he hath lands and tenements of good wealth and sub- 
 stance, ^500. That he married a daughter of Arden, a gentleman of 
 worship." There was an objection made that the arms selected 
 too much resembled those of Lord Manley ; but the answer to the 
 objection made was that the spear on the bend was a patible 
 difference. 
 
 In 1599 there was a further request to be allowed to impale the 
 arms of Arden, which was granted by William Camden, now Claren- 
 cieux king-at-arms, going through the previous grant, and adding 
 (MS. Coll. of Arm, R. 21): "And we have lykewise uppon another 
 escucheon impaled the same with the auncyent arms of the said 
 Arden of Wellingcote, signifying thereby that it maye and shalbe 
 lawfull for the said John Shakespeare gent, to beare and use the 
 same shields of armes single or impaled as aforesaid, during his 
 natural lyfe, and that it shalbe lawful for his children, issue, and 
 posterity to beare, use, and quarter, and shewe for the same with 
 their dewe difference in all lawfull warlyke feates and civill use. 
 The arms of Arden were, " Ermine a fessechequy, or and azure. Crest, 
 on a chapeau azure turned up ermine a boar passant, or. Motto, 
 Quo me cunque vocat patria." Therefore three successive kings-at- 
 arms allowed this coat of arms, i.e. Cooke, Dethick, Camden. — From 
 Mr. Russel French's Genealogica khakespcarcana.
 
 APPENDIX. 247 
 
 A. W. C. Hallen's Pedigree of Shakspere's Family : — 
 
 In the draft of the grant of arms, John Shakspere is styled 
 gentleman, and his great-grandfather referred to as having rendered 
 faithful and valiant service to Henry VII. A facsimile of the grant 
 of arms by Sir William Dethick, Garter, 20th October 1596, also of 
 the assignment of arms to Mary Arden, his wife, in 1599, appeared 
 in Miscellanea Genealogica and Heraldica, 3rd series, July 1884, p. 
 109. 
 
 There is also a manuscript in the Heralds' Office, marked W. 2, 
 p. 276, where notice is taken of this coat, and that the person to 
 whom it was granted had borne magistracy at Stratford-on-Avon. 
 — Waldron's Shakespearean Miscellany. 
 
 The Shakespeare arms, not impaled with the Ardens, are placed 
 over William's tomb in Stratford Church, probably through the 
 choice of his surviving relatives. It has often been represented 
 that he was buried in the chancel, only because he owned the tithes. 
 I think not. In the Stratford Registers are notices of the extra fees 
 to be paid for those that are buried in the church and the chancel. 
 And in the Returnc from Pernassus, "Perceval" is_made to say of 
 his father, " Marrie I coulde be contente to be at coste to burie him 
 in the churche, but that I will not bringe up new customes ; he 
 shall lie with his posteritie in the churchyard." 
 
 Note 10. — Bacon's Great Work. 
 
 While Bacon was still at the University, his revolt against 
 Aristotle took shape, and he conceived the first sketch of his great 
 work, calling it " Partus Temporis Maximus," or " The Greatest Birth 
 of Time." His legal studies prevented him from following this out 
 either as fully or as rapidly as he would have wished. Yet his life- 
 thought ever turned towards it, and it came out in parts. 
 
 "Francis of Verulam reasoned thus with himself, and judged it 
 to be for the interest of the present and future generations that they 
 should be made acquainted with his thoughts." And future genera- 
 tions have found it to be so. The plan of the great work was not 
 strictly adhered to, and never completed. 
 
 Instauralio Magna. 
 
 It was in six parts. 
 
 1. The Division of the Sciences. 
 
 2. The New Organon, or Directions concerning the Interpretation 
 of Nature.
 
 24S APPENDIX. 
 
 3. The Phenomena of the Universe, or a Natural and Experimental 
 History for the Foundation of Philosophy. 
 
 4. The Ladder of the Intellect. 
 
 5. The Forerunners or Anticipators of the New Philosophy. 
 
 6. The New Philosophy or Active Science. The first part of the 
 Instauration, The Advancement of Learning he published in 1605 
 and dedicated to James I. The second part of the Instauration or 
 New Organon appeared in 1620, incomplete, because "he numbered 
 his days, and would have it saved." Various other works, published 
 or designed for publication by him as parts of the Instauratio Magna, 
 are — 
 
 Natural and Experimental History of the Winds. 
 
 History of Heavy and Light. 
 
 History of Sympathy and Antipathy. 
 
 History of Sulphur, Mercury, and Salt. 
 
 Fragment of Abecedarium Naturae. 
 
 History of Life and Death. 
 
 History of Dense and Hare. 
 
 Sylva Sylvarum, or Natural History. 
 
 Inquiry respecting the Magnet. 
 
 Inquiry respecting Light and Luminous Matter. 
 
 Catalogue of Particular Histories. 
 
 Other works connected, but not meant to be included in the 
 Instauratio Magna. 
 
 Thoughts on the Nature of Things. 
 On the Ebb and Flow of the Sea. 
 New Atlantis. 
 On Principles and Origins. 
 Magnalia Naturae. 
 
 Works intended to be included, but superseded, are- 
 Description of the Intellectual Globe. 
 Theory of the Heavens. 
 Valerius Terminus. Filum Labyrinthi. 
 Cogitata et Visa. De Motu. Calor et Frigus. 
 Historia Soni et Auditus. Phasnomena Universi. 
 Physiological and Medical Kemains. 
 
 The Instauratio was published in 1623.
 
 APPENDIX. 249 
 
 Note ii. — The Opinion of Contemporaries. 
 
 In Fragmenta Regalia, or Observations on the late Queen Eliza- 
 beth, her Times and Favourites, written by Sir Kobert Naunton, 
 Master of the Court of Wards, 1653, Sir Nicholas Bacon is men- 
 tioned on p. 38. " He was father to that refined wit, which since 
 hath acted a disastrous part on the publique stage, and of late sate 
 in his father's room as Lord Chancellor. Those that lived in his 
 age, and from whence I have taken this little model of him, give 
 him a lively character, and they decipher him for another Solon, 
 and the Synon of those times, such a one as Oedipus was in dis- 
 solving of riddles. Doubtless he was as able an instrument ; and 
 it was his commendation, that his Head was the Mawl, (for it was 
 a great one), and therein he kept the wedge that entered the knotty 
 pieces that came to the Table." 
 
 Ben Jonson on Bacon — Timber : — " My conceit of his person 
 was never increased towards him by his place or honours, but I 
 have and do reverence him for the greatness that was only proper 
 to himself, in that he seemed to me ever, by his work, one of the 
 greatest men, and most worthy of admiration, that had been in 
 many ages. In his adversity, I ever prayed that God would give 
 him strength ; for greatness he could not want. Neither could I 
 condole in a word or syllable for him, as knowing no accident could 
 do harm to virtue, but rather help to make it manifest." Jonson's 
 opinion of his talents is mentioned in Chapters iv. and v. 
 
 In State Trials, vol. ii., I find in the arraignment of Bacon, " The 
 person against whom it is alleged is no less than the Lord Chancellor, 
 a man so endued with all parts, both of nature and art, as that I 
 will say no more of him, being not able to say enough. The matter 
 is corruption." 
 
 Bacon acknowledged this, and pled guilty, but he was very mildly 
 treated by all. He said that though the censure was just, yet he 
 had been the justest judge they had for long. Peter Bomer, his 
 domestic apothecary, suggested that a statue should be erected to 
 his memory in acknowledgment of his moral virtues. "Therefore 
 it is a thing to be wished (he having died on the 9th of April 1626, 
 aged 62 years) that a statue in honour of him may be erected in 
 his country, as a memorable example to all of virtue, kindness, 
 peacefulness, patience." 
 
 Those who saw him nearest in life gave him the best character : 
 those who criticised him in parts, admired him as a whole. 
 
 Sir Henry Wotton wrote to Bacon on receiving three copies of 
 his great work : — " Your Lordship hath done a great and everlasting 
 benefit to all the children of Nature, and to Nature herself in her
 
 250 APPENDIX. 
 
 utmost extent of latitude, who never before had so noble and so 
 true an interpreter, never so inward a secretary of her cabinet." 
 
 There is no doubt that he might have outlived his technical dis- 
 grace, and gained a new dignity among his contemporaries as a 
 philosopher and man of science, as he has with his successors ; for 
 he left his memory to the next ages, and they have forgot the poli- 
 tician and remembered only the author of the great work that 
 founded the new school of thought we have named " The Baconian 
 Philosophy." 
 
 Note 12. — Bacon's Essays. 
 
 Bacon's Essays appeared in very small octavo, 1597, dedicated to 
 his only brother, Anthony. In the Preface he says : — " I do now, 
 like some that have an orchard ill-neighboured, that gather their 
 fruit before it is ripe to prevent stealing." This points to the 
 common habit of lending about works in manuscript ; and though 
 it suggests that some one meant to rob him, it also seems that 
 Bacon was able to forestall him. The Stationers' Registers show 
 how. 
 
 24th Jan. 1597. — Richard Serger entered for his copie under the 
 hand of Master Warden Dawson, a book entituled Essayes of Master 
 Francis Bacon, with the prayers of his Sovereigne, vj d . 
 
 Cancellatur ista intratio per curiam tentam 7 February. See 
 correct entry below. 
 
 Humphrey Hooper entered for his copie under the handes of 
 Master Francis Bacon, Master Doctor Stanhope, Master Barlowe, 
 and Master Warden Dawson, A booke intituled Essaies, Religious 
 Meditationes, Places of Perswasion and Disswasion by Master 
 Frauncis Bacon vj d . 7th February. 
 
 The first is evidently the pirated edition he alludes to. Here 
 Bacon is treated as "Censor" of his own book. "Under the 
 handes " is the phrase of permission. 
 
 Montaigne's Essays, published in French, 1580, translated by 
 Florio, 1603, were probably introduced to Bacon's notice by his 
 brother Anthony, who knew Montaigne while wandering on the 
 Continent between 1579 and 1592. His endless rambling from the 
 subject must have been distasteful to Bacon's more methodical 
 spirit, yet the novelty of the form attracted him, and he began to 
 write down his own ideas in his own way in this new essay 
 form; so that when published in 1597, he was able to say they 
 had passed long ago from his pen. Yet he utterly ignored 
 his guide, and in his second edition of 16 12 he refers Prince 
 Henry in the dedication to Seneca's Epistles to Lucullus as the
 
 APPENDIX. 251 
 
 prototype of the modern essay. Not only, however, was Mon- 
 taigne his predecessor, but a small book of essays appeared 
 in 1596 called Anonymous, his Remedies against Discontent, which 
 discourses are 1. Howe wee ought to prepare ourselves against 
 passion. 2. Of the choice of affaires. 3. Of foresight. 4. Of 
 the vocation of every man. 5. How wee ought to rule our 
 life. 6. Of the diversitie of men's actions. 7. Of the choice of 
 friends. 8. Of dissembling. 9. Of vanitie. 10. Of prosperitie. 
 
 11. A comparison of our owne estate, with the fortune of other men. 
 
 12. Of adversitie. 13. Of sorrow. 14. Of the affection of good 
 men. 15. Of other men's faults. 16. Of injuries, wrongs, and dis- 
 graces. 17. Of povertie. 18. Of death. So that though Bacon 
 established this form, he was not quite the first English Essayist. 
 See Arber's Reprints. 
 
 Machiavelli's Discourses upon Livy's First Decade was a favourite 
 book with Bacon, and he must have owed the suggestion of 
 his essay on the Vicissitude of Things to Chap. v. Book ii. of 
 Machiavelli. Rawley said that when he had occasion to use other 
 men's words, he had a use and a faculty to dress them in better 
 vestments and apparel than they had before ; hence, perhaps, he did 
 not acknowledge them. 
 
 Note 13. — Conference of Pleasure. 
 
 Mr. James Spedding edits a " Conference of Pleasure " (called " Mr 
 Francis Bacon of Tribute or giving what is dew "), composed for 
 some festive occasion about 1592 by Francis Bacon, and found in a 
 MS. belonging to the Duke of Northumberland. In a supplement 
 to Stephen's second collection of smaller pieces of Lord Bacon 
 were two pieces — " Mr. Bacon in Praise of his Sovereign," and " Mr. 
 Bacon in Praise of Knowledge," which are found to be parts of this 
 whole. Four friends meet. A presides ; B gives an oration in praise 
 of Fortitude, the noblest virtue ; C, in praise of Love, the noblest 
 affection ; D, in praise of Knowledge, the noblest power ; A, in 
 praise of his sovereign, the noblest person, who combines all these 
 qualities. The style is utterly unlike that of Shakspere. It is 
 copied by a scribe in a folio paper book of twenty-two sheets. 1st. 
 comes the Conference of Pleasure in full. Then 2nd. comes an 
 Essay on Magnanimity, afterwards merged in the advancement 
 of learning. 3rd. An advertisement touching private censure. 
 4th. An advertisement touching the controversies of the Church 
 of England. 5th. A letter to a French gentlemen— the middle 
 sheet, where some may have been lost. 6th. The Hermit's first 
 speech. 7th. The Hermit's second speech. 8th. The Soldier's
 
 252 APPENDIX. 
 
 speech. 9th. The Secretaire's speech. 10th. The Squyre's speech, 
 written for a device, 1595, presented by the Earl of Essex on the 
 Queen's day. nth. For the Earl of Sussex at ye . . tilt, An: 
 96. 12th. A letter like Cabala. 13th. A copy of Leicester's Com- 
 monwealth. 
 
 On the back, among various scribblings, are written these titles 
 in a list. 
 
 Below in another column — 
 
 Richard the Second. 
 
 Richard the Third. 
 
 Asmund and Cornelia. 
 
 Isle of Dogs poem 1 by Thomas Nash and inferior players. These 
 are not in this volume. 
 
 All over the page scribbled William Shakespeare, Francis Bacon. 
 Ne vele velis, &c. 
 
 There is no trace of Bacon's own handwriting. 
 
 It is supposed to have lain since Bishop Percy's time in two black 
 boxes awaiting investigation. 
 
 The printed form of Shakspere's name is used. 
 
 Note 14. — Ben Jonson's Purge. 
 
 During Shakspere's early London days an attempt at an Aris- 
 tophanic revival had checked the advance of the Drama, and had 
 brought in laws against the Players. 
 
 Ben Jonson not only differed from Shakspere upon Dramatic 
 Rules and the treatment of the Unities, as we saw in Every Man in 
 his Humour, but he differed from him in regard to the use that may 
 be made of the stage in satirising persons directly. Not only had 
 he satirised known persons and habits in Cynthia's Revels, but in the 
 Poetaster he produced what has been called an Aristophanic play, of 
 which he gave the key in his ordinary conversation. He represented 
 himself as Horace, and Marston and Dekker as Crispinus and Deme- 
 trius. Horace is immeasurably bored by the platitudes, pertinacity, 
 and long words of Crispinus ; and finally gives him a dose that makes 
 him vomit the most objectionable words, some of them sticking in 
 his throat. We may notice that some of these words are now used 
 in our familiar speech, and others have never entered it : Poet. Act 
 v. sc. 1. He is also supposed to have satirised other known con- 
 temporaries, and to have ridiculed Shakspere's coat of arms. He 
 certainly ridicules Players in general in the persons of the sneaking 
 informers Histrio and iEsop, and in the remarks put into the mouth 
 of Lupus about the whole profession, " These players are an idle
 
 APPENDIX. 253 
 
 generation, and do much harm in a state . . . besides they will rob 
 us magistrates of our respect, bringing us upon the stage, and making 
 us ridiculous to plebeians." Deckar answers this in his Satiro-Mastix, 
 in which he castigates Jonson severely. He retains the same 
 characters, and represents Shakspere as " William Rufus " presid- 
 ing at " the untrussing of the Humourous Poet ; " and uses the phrase 
 "Hamlet-Revenge." It is this play of Deckar's that is supposed 
 to be alluded to in the Return from Pcrnassus, Part II. ; though 
 Shakspere's answer to Ben Jonson to which Chapman alludes, 
 appears in the "Malvolio" of The Twelfth Night, and " Thersites 
 and Achilles " of Troilus and Crcssida. Shakspere's satiric vein is, 
 however, mild and gentle, and consistent with the dramatic action 
 of the other characters. "Malvolio," the "cross-gartered gull," 
 however, stuck to Ben a while, and may have purged him of his 
 Humours. 
 
 Note 15. — John Davies. 
 
 John Davies, of Hereford, 1563-1618, was a writing-master. He 
 writes The Scourge of Folly, Microcosmus, Witte's Pilgrimage, The Muse's 
 Sacrifice, and many minor poems ; as well as versified translations 
 of the Psalms. He writes praises of Shakspere, as our English 
 Terence, &c, and in one poem says — 
 
 " Good wine doth need no bush, Lord, who can telle 
 How ofte this old-said saw hath praised new books '! " 
 
 We mention this because the proverb is one of the identities given 
 by the Baconians. 
 
 Sir John Davies, a lawyer and friend of Bacon's, 1569- 1626, 
 publishes Orchestra, 1596; Hymns to Astrcea (Elizabeth), 1599; 
 Metrical Psalms, Nosce Teipsum, 1599. Went to Scotland to "wel- 
 come" King James in 1601. Bacon asked him then to be good to 
 " conceled poets," and he doubtless was so, as we find James ready 
 to receive Bacon when he came to England. Query, Whether did 
 Bacon write his Orchestra, Psalms, or Nosce Teipsum, or all three ? 
 
 It is well to notice these similar names so near the same date, and 
 avoid confusion.
 
 254 APPENDIX. 
 
 Note 16. — List of Actors. 
 
 The chief actors in the plays mentioned in the 1623 edition are : — 
 William Shakspere, 1564-1616. — For life see "Outlines" by J. 
 Halliwell-Phillips. He had chief charge of the King's Players until 
 1604; and they got into trouble when he left them. He evidently 
 acted the young lovers in his youth, but gradually retiring as he 
 wrote and managed more, latterly played stately parts, like the 
 ghost in Hamlet and Adam in As you Like it. 
 
 llichard Burbage, 1567-1619. — Three years younger than Shak- 
 spere, he seemed to have been trained to take Shakspere's parts, 
 and succeeded so well as to allow Shakspere to retire gradually. 
 He took all principal parts ; especially Hamlet. That he grew fat, 
 the different editions of the play show. In the early editions the 
 age is reckoned different. It keeps pace with Burbage's age, and 
 the later edition says, "He's fat and scant of breath." His grand- 
 father, John Burbage, was bailiff of Stratford in 1555 ; his father, 
 James Burbage, was first a joiner, then a first player in Earl 
 Leicester's company; in May 1574 he "was authorised to act." 
 When he went to London, he " became the chief builder of play- 
 houses." Richard had a daughter named Juliet, 1602-1608; a son 
 William, 1616; and he himself died in 1619 at the same age as 
 Shakspere. 
 
 " Dick Burbage that most famous man, 
 That actor without peer, 
 With this same part his course began, 
 
 And kept it many a year. 
 Shakespeare was fortunate I trow 
 
 That such an actor had ; 
 If we had but his equal now, 
 For one I should be glad." 
 — Manuscript of time of Charles I. Collier's Memoirs of the Principal 
 Actors. 
 
 John Hemming, probably a Warwickshire man, born 1556, was an 
 important actor in 1599. He relinquished the active duties of his 
 profession at the time of bringing out the folio edition, the printing 
 of which must have taken a year. 
 
 Augustine Philipps, first heard of as acting in 15S8, was in early 
 youth a comic actor, became more serious later, and died May 1605. 
 
 Samuel Gilbarne. 
 
 Robert Arnim, also a pamphleteer of London. Tarleton made 
 Arnim his adopted son ; probably born in 1570. 
 
 William Ostler was one of the "children" in the Queen's Chapel 
 in 1601, and was married before 1612, but little is known of him.
 
 APPENDIX. 255 
 
 Nathan Field was born in 1587, the same year his father, a Puri- 
 tan preacher, died. He became a good actor and successor to 
 Burbage. 
 
 William Kemp, the author of Kcmpe's Jig, succeeded Richard 
 Tarleton as Comedian in 15S9, and was the original Dogberry, and 
 Peter, Gravedigger, &c. He was a finished actor. He left the com- 
 pany in 1592 to join Alleyn. He visited Rome; and then lived in 
 Southwark. He " expanded plays," as is alluded to in Hamlet; and 
 was dead before 1609, when Dekker wrote the Gul's Hornbook. 
 
 Thomas Poope, probably a Warwickshire man, first mentioned 
 in 1588. Supposed to have sold his shares to Shakspere. Died in 
 1603. 
 
 George Bryan acted in Tarleton's Dance of the Seven Deadly Sins. 
 He had a son 17th February 1599, but no record of his birth or 
 death has been found. 
 
 Henry Condell was not mentioned in the players' lists of 1 587. In 
 159S he acted in Ben Jonson's Every Man in His Humour (see ed. 
 1616), and played in most of the dramas of Beaumont and Fletcher 
 with Burbage. Died 1627. 
 
 William Slyc, a common name in Warwickshire ; he lived in 
 Norman's Rents, Southwark, in 1858, and acted in 2nd part of Tarle- 
 ton's Seven Deadly Sins. Died 16th August 1608. 
 
 Richard Cowley appears also in Tarleton's Dance, he acted Verges, 
 and died 1618. 
 
 John Lowine, son of Richard Lowine, born in St. Giles, Cripple- 
 gate, 1576; acted in Sejanus along with Shakspere; wrote a book 
 on Dances. Died in 1668. 
 
 Samtiel Crosse, probably a Blackfriars man. 
 
 Alexander Cooke, one of a numerous family, joined the company 
 young, and acted as a woman in Sejanus and The Fox. 
 
 John Underwood. Nicholas Tooley. 
 
 William Ecclestone. Joseph Taylor. 
 
 Robert Benfield. Robert Goughe. 
 
 Richard Robinson. John Shancke. \ 
 John Rice. 
 
 Besides these players mentioned we have also notice of Lawrence 
 Fletcher, who died in 1608, and was buried in St. Saviour's, Southwark. 
 
 Gabriel Spenser, the man slain by Ben Johnson, 24th September 
 1598, in Hogesden Fields. 
 
 Edmund Shakspere, "a player buried in the church with a fore- 
 noon ' knell of the great bell 20 s ." Books of St. Saviour's, Southwark. 
 
 1 I think this is probably owing to the Players being accustomed to act 
 in the afternoon they would take the forenoon for their funeral rites.
 
 256 APPENDIX. 
 
 Note 17. — Baudwtn. 
 
 William Baudwin, author of the Myrrour for Magistrates, has a 
 poem on Richard II. and on Richard III. 157 1. 
 
 He is the compiler of a " Treatise on Morall Philosophy, contayn- 
 ing the sayings of the wyse wherein you maye see the worthie and 
 wittie sayings of the Philosophers, Emperors, Kynges and Orators, 
 of their lyves, their aunswers, of what linage they come of ; of what 
 countrie they were, whose worthy and notable precepts, counsailes, 
 parables and semblables, doe hereafter followe." The editions of 
 1547, 1567, 1575, 1584, 1587, 1591, 1596, 1610, 1620, 1630, are in the 
 British Museum. 
 
 His 1st Book is — 
 
 1 Of Lives and Aunswers. 
 2nd. Of Philosophical Theologie. 
 3rd. Of Kynges and Rulers, and of Lawe. 
 4th. Of Sorrow and Lamentation. 
 5th. Of Mental Powers and Virtues. 
 6th. An admonition to avoid all kinds of vices. 
 
 This has been a rich field for readers and writers of the period, 
 and one can trace much of Shakspere's knowledge and philosophy 
 to it. 
 
 Note 18.— Printers. 
 
 Through the difficulties of books patented for a certain number 
 of years or for life, great troubles arose among the printers, some of 
 whom could not support themselves, A Commission was appointed 
 on 1st June 1583. The Bishop of London wrote — " I was enformed 
 that printinge of laufull bookes, and suche as be nott otherwise 
 appointed by her Majestie's graunter, is not matter sufficient to 
 mainteigne anye man withoute his losse." The wardens of the 
 Stationers' Company told him that the patentees had eaten up the 
 trade. Robert Bourne, on 3rd February 1586, pleading before the 
 Star Chamber, said that he had been an apprentice printer for 
 eight years, and was now free, with no other means of livelihood, 
 " having no other trade whereby to lyve and maintene himself and 
 his family then the arte of printinge, doth think it no lesse un- 
 reasonable to prohibit him from all labour, than to prohibit him 
 from printing in his lawful trade which, although by theirs and 
 such other like priviledges to other particular persons graunted 
 some for printing of lawe books, some for psalm books, some for
 
 APPENDIX. 257 
 
 grammar bokes, schoole bookes, Latyne Hebrewe and Greke bokes, 
 almanner of praier books, Bibles and Service bookes, there is almost 
 no liberty lefte for printinge but for ballettes and toyes and such 
 like, which might with better reason be prohibited then the rest, 
 and which will not suffice to maintaine the printers not priveledged 
 and their families (this defendant veryly thinketh), with bread and 
 water." Hence arose pirated editions. Roger Ward printed 10,000 
 copies of the "ABC with the little catechism appointed by her 
 Highness' injunctions for the Instruction of Children," with the 
 patentees Day's name and trade-mark thereon, out of which rose the 
 Star-Chamber case. The patentees were reasonable, and gave workes 
 for " the reliefe of the poore of the Company," and the Master and 
 Wardens gained the right of imposing sixpence in the pound for 
 registration. School-books were the most lucrative of "patents" 
 then. 
 
 In 1583. — The Stationers' Company of London also had a conflict 
 with the University of Cambridge about printing ; and in 1586 there 
 were great disputes among them about the powers of the Company. 
 The Sweeping Star Chamber decree of 23rd June 1586 finally con- 
 cluded this agitation, and confirmed the power of the Company in 
 the hands of the Master, Wardens, and Assistants ; and of such as 
 by co-optation should succeed them. 
 
 25th Dec. 159S. — The later rule they formulated was this: 1 
 " Whereas several members of this Company have great part of 
 their estates in Copies; and by ancient usage of the Company, 
 when any book or copy is duly entered in the Register Book of 
 this Company to any member or members of this Company, such 
 person to whom such entry is made is, and always hath been 
 reputed and taken to be the Proprietor of such book or copie, 
 and ought to have the sole printing thereof, which privilege and 
 interest is now of late often violated and abused. It is therefore 
 ordained, That where any Entry or Entries is, or are, or hereafter 
 shall be duly made of any Book or Copy in the said Register- 
 Book of this Company, by, or for any Member or Members of this 
 Company, that in such case, if any other Member or Members of 
 this Company, for whom such Entry is duly made in the Register- 
 Book of this Company, or his or their Assignee or Assigns, Print, or 
 cause to be Printed, Import or cause to be Imported from beyond 
 seas, or elsewhere, any such Copy or Copies, Book or Books, or any 
 part of such Copy or Copies, Book or Books, or shall sell, bind, 
 stitch, or expose the same, or any part or parts thereof to sale, 
 That then such Member or Members so offending, shall forfeit to 
 
 1 An Act made 19th year, King Henry VII. renewed in 33d Charles II.
 
 2 5 8 • APPENDIX. 
 
 the Master and Keepers or Wardens and Commonalty of the 
 Mystery or Art of Stationers of the City of London, the sum of 
 Twelve Pence for every such Copy or Copies, Book or Books, or 
 any part of such Copy or Copies, Book or Books Imprinted, Im- 
 ported, sold, bound, stitcht, and exposed to sale contrary hereunto." 
 The Master and Wardens had also the privilege of searching any 
 Warehouse suspected of evading this order, and of imposing a 
 penalty of Ten Pounds on refusal.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Abbot, Dr., 195 
 
 Acolastus, 12 
 
 Adonis, 37, 117 
 
 Advancement of Learn ing, 72, 87, 88 
 
 Advice to Lord Esses, 31 
 
 JEschylus, 29 
 
 Ajax, 34 
 
 Albans, St., 35 
 
 Alleyne, 130, 188 
 
 All's Well that Ends Well, 48, 102, 
 
 138 
 Alpha and Omega, 18 
 Alphabet, 193, 204, 205 
 Anatomy of Abuse (Stubbs), 55 
 Anatomy of Melancholy (Burton), 
 
 42, 43, 137, 149, 218 
 Anstie, Samuel, 172 
 Antaeus, 227 
 Antony and Cleopatra, 49, 63, 64, 
 
 65, 69, 102, 103, 138 
 Apollo, 34, 163, 164, 165 
 Apollo (tavern), 16 
 Apology for Actors, 93 
 Apophthegms, 86, 87 
 Aqua vito?, 47, 48 
 Arcadia, 14, 170, 194 
 Arcadianism, 17 
 Archy's Banquet of Jests, 149 
 Arden, 4, 5, 8 
 Arden, Ileraud of, 4 
 Arden, Mary, 6, 8, 35 
 Aristotle, 29, 34, 44, 190 
 Asbies, 13, 108 
 Asmund and Cornelia, 106 
 
 As You Like It, 28, 48, 51, 60, 88, 
 
 103, 138 
 Attorney-General, 18 
 Aubrey, John, 179, 180 
 Aulicus Mercurius, 163, 164 
 Autolycus, 31 
 
 Avisa, Henry Willobie's, 115 
 Avon, 4, 5, 146 
 Ayhvard, Paul, 165 
 
 BACON, Anthony, 181, 193, 201 
 
 Bacon, Delia, 185, 187 
 
 Bacon, Francis, 18-27, 29, 37, 42-47, 
 
 70-89, 184 
 Bacon, Roger, 43 
 Bacon, Sir Nicholas, 87 
 Baconians, 42, 43, 163, 186, 215, 227 
 Baker, Sir Richard, 162, 170, 172 
 Bancroft, Thomas, 157 
 Bardolph, 35 
 Barkstead, 130 
 Barn field, Richard, 122 
 Barnstaple, 15 
 Barton, 35 
 Basse, W., 141 
 Bath, 15 
 Baudwin, 3 1, 44 
 Baynes, Mr., 7 
 Beaumont, 133, 163-166, 168, 170, 
 
 172, 173, 176, 181, 187 
 Becon, 3 
 
 Beer, 76, 77, 84, 85, 86 
 Belasio, 203 
 Bell, William, 169 
 
 R
 
 260 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Benson, John, 158 
 
 Berni, 7, 189 
 
 Blackfriars, 10, 13, 108 
 
 Blades, Mr., 14 
 
 Bodley, Sir Thomas, 21, 23, 24 
 
 Bohemia, 35 
 
 Bolton, Edmund, 132, 184 
 
 Bourchier, Sir Henry, 146. 
 
 Boys, Sir Roland de, 36 
 
 Breedy, Daniel, 166 
 
 Bristol, 15 
 
 British Museum, 161, 174, 213 
 
 Brome, Richard, 157, 170, 171, 172 
 
 Brooke, Christopher, 135 
 
 Brown, Mr., 40 
 
 Bruno, Giordano, 22, 190 
 
 Buck, Sir George, 167 
 
 Buckhurst, Lord, 22, 121 
 
 Burkhead, Henry, 165 
 
 Burleigh, 31 
 
 Burbage, n, 13, 16, 108, 137, 170] 
 
 Burns, Robert, 18 
 
 Burton, Robert, 42, 43, 137, 149, 
 
 217, 218 
 Butler, Charles, 161. 
 
 Cade, Jack, 58] 
 
 Cain, 36 
 
 Cambridge, 20, 218 
 
 Camden, 3, 118, 129, 148, 187 
 
 Canning, W., 27 
 
 Cannon, 34 
 
 Carew, Richard, 118 
 
 Carlyle, Thomas, 214 
 
 Cartwright, William, 166, 169 
 
 Cary, 164, 165 
 
 Castara, 154 
 
 Cato, 35 
 
 Cavendish, Lady Margaret, 175, 
 
 176 
 Centurie of Prayse, 146, 210 
 Cephalus and Procris, 117, 175 
 Cervantes, 40 
 Chamberlain, Robert, 157 
 Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, 
 
 185 
 Chancellor, Lord, 18, 23 
 
 Chapman, 129, 133, 167, 187 
 
 Chaucer, Jeffrey, 14, 184 
 
 Christian paradoxes, 43 
 
 Cider, 45, 47 
 
 Ciphers, 200-205, 219, 220 
 
 Clark's Polimanteia, 116 
 
 Crecy, 34 
 
 Clement, 35 
 
 Clopton, Sir Hugh, 211 
 
 Cokaine, Sir Aston, 36, 153, 170, 
 
 171 
 Cof/itata et visa, Bacon's, 21 
 Coke, Sir Edward, 22 
 Cola's Fury, 165 
 Collier, 194 
 
 Colours of Good and Evil, 46 
 Comedy, 17 
 Condell, 13, 140, 141, 191, 218, 
 
 219 
 Conference of Pleasure, Bacon, 19, 
 
 24, 106, 192 
 Constantinople, 34 
 Cooke, John, 128, 167 
 Copernicus, 23 
 Cordelia, 29 
 Coriolanus, 35, 58, 62, 102, 103, 
 
 138 
 Com, Bacon on, 72 
 Cotsall, 36 
 
 Coventry, 4, 5, 11, 15, 36 
 Cowden Clarke, Mrs., 33, 195 
 Cowley, Abraham, 149, 171 
 Cuffe, Sir Henry, 23 
 Cunningham, Mr., 128 
 Curtis, 35 
 Cymbeline, 35, 53, 102, 103, 138, 
 
 145, 206 
 
 Daily Telegraph, 199 
 Daniel, George, of Beswick, 166 
 Daniel, Samuel, 119, 121, 163 
 Davenant, William, 146, 153, 157, 
 
 164, 178, 180 
 Davenport, Anthony, 168 
 Davies, Sir John, of Hereford, 
 
 22, 88, .107, 127, 133, 144, i 93 , 
 
 217
 
 INDEX. 
 
 261 
 
 De Augment is, 28, 75, 82, 83, 107, 
 201 
 
 Debate betiveen Pride and Lowli- 
 ness, The, in 
 
 Declaration of the causes of the 
 great troubles, Bacon, 19 
 
 Dekkar, 55, 120, 126, 133, 134 
 
 Democritus, 76 
 
 Denham, Sir John, 166 
 
 Dense and Bare, History of, Bacon, 
 73, Si 
 
 De Occultis Literarum Hotis, 203 
 
 Dethroning Shakspere, 199 
 
 De Witt papers, 118, 190, 209 
 
 Diana of Montemayor, 194 
 
 Diaphantus, 128: 
 
 Did Francis Bacon write Shak- 
 spere? 196 
 
 Digges, Leonard, 144, 159 
 
 Discipline, 29 
 
 Discovery of the Cipher of Francis 
 Bacon, Mrs. Windle's, 205 
 
 Disposing of Wards, the, Bacon's, 
 21 
 
 Divers plots and devices, 26 
 
 Dog, 38 
 
 Dogberry, 31 
 
 Donnelly, Mr. Ignatius, 46, 207- 
 226 
 
 Donne, 163 
 
 Douce, 33 
 
 Douglas, 34 
 
 Dover, 15 
 
 Drama, 18 
 
 Dramatic poetry, 29 
 
 Drayton, 4-6, 116, 120, 121, 149, 
 164, 165, 170 
 
 Drummond, William, 133, 134, 144 
 
 Drunkenness, Bacon on, 85 
 
 Dryden, John, 176-178, 180 
 
 Dugdale, 162, 171 
 
 Eccentricities of genius, 31 
 
 Edinburgh, 16 
 
 Edwardes, Thomas, 117 
 
 Elegies, 42 
 
 Elizabeth, Queen, 16, 22, 30, 31, 41 
 
 Ellis, Mr., 203 
 
 England's Helicon, 124, 132, 135 
 England's Mourning Garment, 127 
 England's Parnassus, 123 
 Epistle dedicatory to the Kin?, 
 
 Bacon's, 24 
 Erasmus, 7, 44, 209 
 Errors, Coined// of, 25-27, 48, 102, 
 
 121, 128, 138, 189 
 Essays, Bacon's, 20, 41, 43, 216 
 Essex, Earl of, 19, 31, 41, 70, 200 
 Euphues, Lyly's, 14, 194 
 Euphuism, 17 
 Every Boy's Book, 201 
 
 Faerie Queene, 14, 170 
 
 Farmer, 185 
 
 Faversham, 15 
 
 Feldon, 4 
 
 Feltham, Owen, 155 
 
 Field, llichard, 10, 14, 38, 108 
 
 Fisher, Clement, of Wincot, 36, 
 
 171 
 Flecknoe, Richard, 172 
 Fletcher, 134, 155, 163-166, 167, 
 
 168, 170, 176, 181, 182 
 Florio, 15, 194 
 
 Flower, Mr., of Stratford, 37 
 Fluellen, 35 
 Folkestone, 15 
 
 Food, History of, Bacon's, 71 
 Ford, 36 
 
 Fonnan, Dr. Simon, 133 
 Foure Letters and Certain Sonnets, 
 
 Harvey, 113 
 Fragmenta Aurea, Suckling's, 154 
 Freeman, Thomas, 17, 134, 135 
 Fuller's Worthies, 173 
 Furnival, Dr., 2, 163 
 
 Galen, 33 
 
 Gammer Gurton's Needle, 12, 223, 
 
 224 
 Gayton, Edmund, 170 
 General treatise De Lcgibus tt 
 
 Justia, 21 
 Gerard, 13, 194
 
 262 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Gesta Grayorum, 27, 192 
 
 Globe, 13, 134, 213 
 
 Gondibert, 170 
 
 Gower, 14, 35 
 
 Gray's Inn, 25, 26 
 
 Great Assises holden in Parnassus, 
 
 The, 163, 192, 208 
 Great cryptogram, 208, 224, 226 
 Greene, Robert, 12, 14, 44, 87, 111, 
 
 114, 121, 194 
 
 Greene, Thomas, 38 
 
 Gregory, 35 
 
 Grenville, Sir Richard, 117 
 
 Groat's Worth of Wit, 111, 112, 114 
 
 Grosart, Dr., 43, 166 
 
 Gull's Hornbook, Dekkar, 120 
 
 Habington, William, 154 
 Hackets, 35, 36 
 Hales, John, of Eton, 153 
 Hall, Mrs. Susanna, 167, 168 
 Halliwell-Phillips, Mr., 9, 14, 15, 
 
 179, 211, 214 
 Hamlet, 34, 36, 38, 49, 69, 99, 103, 
 
 122, 136, 187, 190, 210, 211, 222 
 Hamnet, 36 
 Harvey, 113, 122 
 Haslewood's Essays upon English 
 
 Poets, 132, 184 
 Hathaway, Anne, 17, 108 
 Hatton, Lady, 20 
 Hay ward, Dr., 30 
 Hazlitt, 194 
 Hector, 34 
 Hectors, The, 170 
 Helen to Paris, 93, 175 
 Hemings, John, 13, 140, 141, 145, 
 
 191, 218, 219 
 Henley Street, 9 
 
 1 Henry IV., 34, 50-54- 60-62, 95, 
 103, 121 
 
 2 Henry IV., 59, 61, 62, 96, 103 
 
 3 Henry IV., 50 
 
 Henry V., 49, 51, 63, 103, 117, 128 
 
 1 Henry VI., 102, 107 
 
 2 Henry VI., 49, 60, 103 
 
 3 Henry VI., 34, 48, 103, "7, 138 
 
 Henry YIN., Bacon's story of, 21 
 Henry VIII. (Shakspere's), 42, 49, 
 
 51, 57, 62, 102, 103, 138 
 Herbert, Sir Henry, 145 
 Herbert, George, 170 
 Herbert, Sir "William, 115, 187 
 Hcrmeticall Banquet, drest by a 
 
 Spagiricall Cooke, 169 
 Hermione, 30 
 Herod, 36 
 Heywood, Thomas, 44, 93, 134, 154, 
 
 164, 165, 169 
 History of Plants, 18, 194 
 Histriomastix, Prynne's, 153, 154 
 Holland, Hugh, 129, 142 
 Holland, Samuel, 156, 171 
 Holmes, Hon. Nathaniel, 186, 191, 
 
 226 
 Holy War, Bacon's, 21 
 Horology, 3s 
 Horses, 37, 38 
 Howell, James, 167 
 Hudibras, 174 
 Hypercritica, 132, 184 
 
 Imogen, 30 
 
 Ingleby, Dr., 137, 146, 161, 170, 210 
 Instauratio Magna, 22 
 Interpretation of Nature (Bacon), 89 
 Ireland, Samuel, 15, 180 
 Isle of Dogs, Nash's, 106, 126 
 Is there any resemblance between 
 Shakspere and Bacon? 227 
 
 Jakes, Thomas, of Wonersh, 36 
 
 James I., 19, 23, 31, 41 
 
 James, Richard, 146 
 
 Jamieson, Mr., 185 
 
 John, King, 34, 48, 103, 121 
 
 Johnson, John, 161 
 
 Jonson, Ben, 34, 35, 39, 117. 126, 
 
 133. 142-148, 150, 153, 163-170, 
 172-179, 181, 187, 192, 196, 210, 
 215, 216, 219. 
 
 Judas Iscariot, 34, 36 
 
 Juliet, 30 
 
 Julius Cczsar, 49, 102, 103, 138, 146
 
 INDEX. 
 
 263 
 
 Keats, 32 
 
 Kemp, 16 
 
 Kempis, Thomas a, 19 
 
 Kind Hart's Dream, Cbettle, 114 
 
 King, Thomas, 226 
 
 Kyd, 12 
 
 Laneham's Letter, 51 
 
 Lear, King, 29, 33, 57, 69, 92, 100, 
 
 IO4, 187, 211 
 
 Leicester, 15 
 
 Leland's Collectanea, 51 
 
 Life and Death, History of, Bacon's, 
 
 75, 80, 84 
 Lily, 12, 14, 44, 194 
 Limiting the Jurisdiction of Courts, 
 
 21 
 
 Lirenda's Miserie, Burkhead's, 165 
 
 Locrine, 174 
 
 Lodge, 12 
 
 Loudon, 13, 14, 46, 108, 188 
 
 London Prodigal, The, 174 
 
 Lovelace, R., 172 
 
 Lover's Complaint, 175 
 
 Love's Labour's Lost, 48, 94, 103, 
 
 121, 128 
 Love's Labour Wonne, 121 
 Lore's Martyr, Chester's, 98, 124 
 Lucrece, 13, 19, 28, 92, 101, 122, 175 
 Lucy, Sir Thomas, 8, 9 
 Lydgate, 184 
 
 Macbeth, 49, 63, 64, 102, 103, 138 
 
 Macchiavelli, 34, 165 
 
 Malt, Bacon on, 73, 87 
 
 Markham, George, 117, 123 
 
 Marlborough, 15 
 
 Marlowe, Christopher, 12, 118, 194, 
 
 217, 224 
 Marriage and a Single Life, 20 
 Mars and Venus, 175 
 Marston, John, 122 
 Masques, 28, 108, 109, 192, 215 
 Matthew, Sir Toby, 25, 191, 193, 
 
 204 
 May, 164, 165 
 Mayne, Jasper, 169 
 
 Mead, Bacon on, 45, 75 ' 
 Measure for Measure, 53, 55, 102, 
 
 128, 138 
 Medical Remains, Bacon's, 70 
 Menander, 165 
 
 Menccchmus, 25, 189, 194, 294 
 Merchant of Venice, 38, 50, 55, 95, 
 
 97, IO3, 121, 128, I29, I36 
 
 Mercurius Britannicus, 162, 164 
 Meres, 90, 120, 121 
 "Mermaid," The, 16, 173 
 Merry Wives of Windsor, 42, 49-52, 
 
 54. 57, 98, 103, 128 
 Mervyn, James, 150 
 Midsummer's Night's Dream, 28, 
 
 38, 48, 97, 103, 121 
 Milan, 35 
 Milo, 34 
 
 Milton, John, 150, 167 
 Minute among the Amenities, 187 
 Mirrha, the mother of Adonis, 130 
 Mirror for Magistrates, 107 
 Montaigne, 15, 43, 179, 194, 217, 218, 
 
 220, 222 
 Morgan, Appleton, 187-190 
 Mournful Dittie, 127 
 Much Ado about Nothing, 48, 97, 
 
 103, 136 
 Mysteries, 2, n, 17, 36 
 
 Nash, 13, 55, 87 
 
 Natural History, Bacon's, 70-85. 
 
 New Atlantis, 23, 28, 43, 83, 108 
 
 New Romney, 15 
 
 New Theory, The, 187, 188, 190 
 
 Newe Metamorphosis, 124 
 
 Nicholson, Rev. Dr., 224-226 
 
 Nicholson, Samuel, 123 
 
 No cipher in Shakspere, 224-226 
 
 Novum Organum, 44, 80, 83 
 
 Nosce Teipsum, 193 
 
 Observations on a Libel, Bacon's, 
 
 16 
 O'Connor, William D., 186 
 Oldcastle, Sir John, 174 
 Opus Majus, Roger Bacon's, 43, 44
 
 264 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Opus Minus, 43, 44 
 
 Opus Tertium, 44 
 
 Othello, 49, 66-68, 102, 104, 128, 138, 
 
 156, 189 
 Otway, 227 
 
 Page, 36 
 
 Palladis Tamia, 120 
 
 Palmer, Herbert, D.D., 43 
 
 Palsgrave, Dr. (Acolastus), 12 
 
 Panegyrics, 42 
 
 Paris to Helen, 93, 175 
 
 Parker, Martin, 162 
 
 Passionate Pilgrim, 46, 93, 96, 134, 
 
 135 
 Passionate Shepherd, 175 
 Pastoral Poetry, 17 
 Patteson, Rev. Edward, 15 
 Peacham, Dr., 19 
 Peele, George, 12 
 Pembroke, Earl, 14, 139, 187, 192 
 Pericles, 34, 49, 61, 62, 100, 104, 
 
 I5 2 . 174 
 Perkes of the Hill, 35, 36 
 Pepys' Diary, 174 
 Philipps (Player), 15 
 Phillips-Halliwell, 14 
 Philosophy of Shakspere's Plays 
 
 Unfolded, 185 
 Pilate, 36 
 
 Pierce Plowman, 4, 87, 184 
 Pierce Pennilesse (Nash's), 55, 87, 
 
 "3 
 Pierce's Supererogation (Harvey's), 
 
 114 
 Pilgrimage to Pernassus, 119, 125 
 Plague, 19, 90 
 Plautus, 25, 179, 189, 194 
 Plutarch's Lives, 194, 219 
 Poet- Ape, 148, 219 
 Poetical Revenge, 149 
 Polimantcia, Clarke's, 116 
 Political Purpose of the Renascence 
 
 Drama, 186 
 Pope, 32 
 
 Porta, John Baptist, 203, 204 
 Pott, Mrs., 46, 87, 191, 195, 196 
 
 Praise of Knoivlcdge, Bacon's, 19 
 Praise of his Sovereign, Bacon's, 19 
 Praise of Hemp-Seed, 149 
 Prince of Purpoole, 26, 27 
 Prince of Prigg's Revels, 169 
 Promus, 87, 88, 191, 195 
 Prynne, William, 153, 154 
 Psalms, Bacon's version of, 24, 109 
 Puritan Widow, The, 174 
 Pudsey, Edward, 136 
 Putnam's Magazine, 185 
 
 Quiney, Richard, 18. 
 Quippe for an Upstart Courtier, 
 87, in, 112 
 
 Raleigh, Sir Walter, 22, 121, 191, 
 
 212, 217 
 Ralph Roister Doister, 12, 87, 223 
 Ramsay, H., 156 
 Randolph, Thomas, 152, 153, 158, 
 
 170, 224 
 Ratsey's Ghost, 129, 130, 180 
 Reconciling of Laws, Bacon, 21 
 Renascence drama, 186, 187 
 Resuscitatio, 105 
 Returne from Pernassus, 119, 120, 
 
 124, 125, 224 
 Revel's Book, 128 
 Rich, Lady, 15 
 Richard II., 48, 95, 103, 106, 107, 
 
 121, 136 
 Richard III., 49, 51, 92, 95, 103, 
 
 106, 107, 121, 136, 145 
 Ritter, Dr. Heinrich, 24 
 Roland, Childe, 34 
 Romance of Yachting, 185 
 Romano, Julio, 34 
 Romantic School, 29 
 Romeo and Juliet, 20, 28, 29, 49, 
 
 56, 103, 121, 136 
 
 Rye, 15 
 
 Sackville's Fcrrex and Porrex, 12, 
 
 217 
 Saffron Walden, 15 
 Sandys, 163, 164
 
 I.XDEX. 
 
 265 
 
 San Francisco Chronicle, 207 
 
 Savage, Mr. Richard, 35, 36, 136 
 
 Saxo-Grammaticus, 189 
 
 Scaliger, Joseph, 163 
 
 Scoloker, Anthony, 128 
 
 Scott, Sir Walter, 17 
 
 Scottish history, 34 
 
 Shakspere, John, 6 
 
 Shakspere, William, 3-18, 28-45, 
 
 69, 90-180, 185-189, 225, 226 
 Shakspere on Horseback, 37 
 Shakspere's tours, 15, 44 
 Shaksperean myth, 187 
 Shepherd, 17 
 
 Sheppard, Samuel, 166, 168, 169 
 Shirley, James, 156, 162, 166 
 Shrewsbury, 15 
 Skelton, Laureat, 184 
 
 Sly, 36, 47, 58 
 
 Smethwick, 15 
 
 Smith, Lucy Toulmin, 161 
 
 Smith, William Henry, 186 
 
 Sonnets, 39, 41, 89, 131 
 
 Sortes Shakespcarcana, 221 
 
 Southampton, Earl of, 15, 16, 91, 
 
 92, 132, 187, 190, 192, 212 
 Southwell, Robert, 116 
 Spedding, Mr., 26, 186, 193, 203 
 Speede, 5 
 
 Spenser, 117, 163, 164, 184, 217 
 Spye, The, 165 
 Staffordshire, 15 
 
 Stationers' ..Registers, 138, 198, 218 
 Stow, John, 136 
 Stratford, 5, 10, 15, 17, 35~3 8 , 47, 
 
 171, 174, 175, 180, 186, 198, 209- 
 
 211, 213 
 
 Stubb's Anatomy of Abuses, 55 
 Sturley, Abraham, 18 
 Subjectivity, 40 
 Suckling, Sir John, i53- I SS 
 Surrey, Earl of, 121, 163 
 Sydney, Sir Philip, 14, 163, 191 
 
 Tamburlaine, 13 
 Taming of the Shrew, 36, 47, 49, 
 51, 58, 102, 145 
 
 Tarleton, 16 
 Tasso, Torquato, 164 
 Tatham, Jo., 169 
 Taylor, John, 149 
 Tempest, 15, 49, 62, 69, 102, 138 
 Termagant, 36 
 Terrent, J., 156 
 Thales, 20 
 
 Thirty-two reasons for believing that 
 Bacon wrote Shakespeare, 191- 
 
 193 
 Thomas, Lord Cromwell, History 
 
 of, 174 
 Thompson, Dr. William, 186, 187 
 Thorpe, Thomas, 131, 132 
 Timber, or Discoveries, Jonson's, 
 
 147, 148, 181-183, 215 
 Timon of Athens, 49, 102, 103, 138 
 Titus Andronicus. 48, 92, 103, 121, 
 
 136 
 Traite des Chiffres, 203 
 Travers, 35 
 Troilus and Cressida, 20, 34, 62, 
 
 101, 104, 130, 187, 190, 222 
 Troja Britannka, 93 
 Turks, 34, 36 
 
 Twelfth Night, 49, 56, 102, 138 
 Twickenham, 19 
 
 Two Gentlemen of Verona, 50. 102 
 Two Noble Kinsmen, 175 
 
 Udall, Nicholas {Roister Doister), 
 12, 223 
 
 Valerius Terminus, 200 
 Vaughan, Henry, 170 
 Vautrollier, 14, 38, 194 
 Venus and Adonis, 10, 13, 19, 28, 
 37, 46, 90, 108, 115, 121, 137, 175 
 Verulam, Lord, 163, 164, 182, 206 
 Vigenere, Blaise de, 203, 204, 220 
 Villiers, Christopher, 71 
 Villiers, Sir George, 71 
 Villiers' Rehearsal, 178 
 Vindex Anglicanus, 163 
 Vines, Bacon on. 74 
 Virgil, 88
 
 266 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Visor, William, of Wincot, 36 
 Vivisection, Bacou and Shak- 
 spere on, 187 
 
 WaIPOLB, Horace, 185 
 Ward, Rev. John, 173, 198 
 Warren, John, 158 
 Warwick, 4, 8 
 Warwick, Black Book of, 4 
 Warwick, Guy of, 4 
 Warwickshire, 3, 35, 162, 171, 173, 
 
 180, 212 
 Water, Bacon on, 72 
 Watson, Thomas, 116 
 Webster, 133, 213 
 Weever, John, 123 
 West, Richard, 155 
 White Devil, The, 133, 134 
 White, Roland, 190 
 Will Shakspere, 39, 154, 155 
 William Shakespeare in Romance 
 
 and Reality, 186 
 
 Willobie, Henry, I113 Avisa, 115 
 
 Wilmecote, 35 
 
 Wilson, Thomas, Art of Rhetoric 
 
 7, 89, 189, 194 
 Wincot, 35, 47, 58, 171 
 Windle, Mrs. C. F. A., 205-207, 
 
 218, 221, 222 
 Wine, Bacon on, 45, 72, 76, 79, 80, 
 
 81, 83, 84, 86-89 
 Winter's Tale, 34, 35, 48, 102, 138, 
 
 145, 146 
 Wisdom of the Ancients, 20 
 Withers, George, 164 
 Wittenberg, 34 
 Wordsworth, 17 
 Wotton, Sir Henry, 190-192 
 Wright, Abraham, 156 
 Wyinan, Mr., of Cincinnati, 186, 
 
 226 
 
 Yorkshire Tragedy, A, 174 
 
 THE END. 
 
 PRINTED BY BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO. 
 ' EDINBURGH AND LONDON.
 
 SHORT SELECTIONS 
 
 FROM 
 
 SOME OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
 
 FIRST EDITION. 
 
 " Mr. C. Stopes, a sound Shaksperean, takes occasion to consider 
 the matter from a novel point of view. His inquiry is intelligently 
 ordered, and his results are curious and entertaining. The tendency 
 of the whole argument is, of course, to show the different habits of 
 mind of the two men, and the several interests by which they were 
 animated in their treatment of the question. Shakspere's point of 
 view was, it need hardly be said, purely moral and psychological, 
 while Bacon's (we need scarcely remark) was absolutely scientific. 
 That the Baconian (so caUed) should fail to grasp these differences 
 is no more surprising than that the Gladstonian should Gladstonise, 
 or the Wagnerite date the origins of Opera and the beginnings of 
 Melody from the production of Tristran. Mr. Stopes, however, has 
 done well to bring them out once more, and that upon a point so 
 trivial and so significant as the one he- has chosen ; and as his book 
 contains besides a statement of the whole historical argument, it 
 may be cordially recommended." — Saturday Review, Sept. ist. 
 
 " If we turn from this overwhelming mass of evidence to Bacon, 
 and consider his writings apart from the moral weakness of their 
 author, the calm philosophy, the rigid reasoning, the science, and 
 careful elaboration, we wonder, and with Mr. Stopes conclude, that 
 surely no insult to the character and knowledge, the style and dig- 
 nity of his work, was ever like to this : ' that lie could have invented 
 and inserted Mr. Donnelly's cipher in the plays. It crowns all.' It 
 does, indeed! " — The Spectator, Oct. 13th. 
 
 " An admirable piece of work." — Truth, Nov. 15th. 
 
 "The vast majority of Englishmen, and, it may be added, Ameri- 
 cans, do not need to be convinced that Shakspere wrote the plays 
 of Shakspere. If any one doubts that he did so, and believes 
 that these great poems are the work of Bacon, he cannot do better 
 than read Mr. C. Stopes's little book. It is seldom that we have 
 read with so great pleasure a book on a subject which may at 
 first sight appear to have an interest only for the student and the
 
 2 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 scholar. Mr. Stopes has written a lucid, logical, and able expose" of 
 the fallacies of the Baconians. His answer to Mrs. Pott and Mr. 
 Ignatius Donnelly is complete and effective. The plan of the work 
 under notice is marvellously simple. The author divides his answer 
 into four groups: ist, the probability from the known character 
 and education of the writer of the plays ; 2nd, internal evidence 
 gained by comparing the plays with Bacon's works ; 3rd, the 
 external evidence of most of the poems and plays being at some 
 time claimed by Shakspere, and never by Bacon; and 4th, the 
 external evidence of the writings of contemporaries, some of whom 
 personally knew both Shakspere and Bacon. Proceeding on these 
 lines, Mr. Stopes gives his idea of the character of the country-bred 
 Shakspere, and contrasts it with Bacon's. He says : — ' Turn to 
 Bacon, full of ambitions, with no personal duty to others to raise 
 and purify them. Essentially a city youth, a university student, a 
 classic critic, an observant traveller, a man of the world, a states- 
 man born and bred, a lawyer, a member of Parliament, an essayist, 
 a scientist, a philosopher— in short, the author of The greatest 
 birth of Time: Bacon, the polished man of letters, would have 
 despised the plays, with their neglect of scholarship and their 
 neglect .of the unities. Mr. Stopes's argument on the internal 
 evidence of the plays of Shakspere and Bacon's books is a very 
 strong one. Nothing could be more dissimilar than the passionate 
 Venus and Adonis and the Novum Organum. The external evi- 
 dence is even stronger. With amazing industry Mr. Stopes has 
 collected every allusion to Shakspere by his contemporaries, and 
 shows conclusively that they at least who knew him in the flesh, 
 and saw him act on the stage, believed him to be the author— and 
 never is there a contemporary allusion to Bacon as claiming any of 
 the works attributed to Shakspere. Even Ben Jonson, the friend 
 of Bacon, the man who thought himself the dramatist of the 
 time, condescends to pen verses to the great genius of Stratford- 
 on-Avon. It was left for cranks two and a half centuries later to 
 discover that Bacon, and not Shakspere, was the true author. To 
 our mind this argument is conclusive; but Mr. Stopes has not 
 stopped at this. He takes Mrs. Pott's thirty-two reasons, and shows 
 their want of reason. Nor does he neglect Mr. Donnelly, as befits 
 the bigness of his book. Mr. Stopes's task was an easy one so far 
 as the sympathy of the public goes, but he has certainly performed 
 it in a manner leaving nothing to be desired, and we fancy that the 
 Baconian Society will not get over the hard remarks he deals their 
 theories by ignoring them altogether, for to answer them seems 
 impossible." — The Evening Post (Leading Article), Aug. 20th. 
 
 "The controversy which has arisen on the bizarre contention that
 
 PRESS NOTICES. 3 
 
 Shakspere's plays and poems were not written by Shakspere at all, 
 but by Francis Bacon, has not been without at least one profitable 
 result, inasmuch as it has, in this studiously-prepared and most in- 
 teresting volume, received a contribution in which are collected the 
 sayings and the sentiments which our great national, and not yet 
 disenthroned, poet gives to many of his characters, when the ways 
 and usages of his countrymen in the matter of beer, wine, and drinking 
 chance to come in view. It at the same time states very fully and 
 very fairly, and examines very carefully, the main arguments ad- 
 duced on both sides of the controversy, and, as it appears to us, 
 utterly refutes the claim set up for Bacon. We may leave it to the 
 attentive perusal of all who feel an interest in the subject, promising 
 them that they will find in its pages much pleasant reading of a very 
 instructive kind." — The Morning Advertiser, Sept. 1st. 
 
 " Written in a clear and interesting style." — Scotsman, Aug. 20th. 
 
 "To the Bacon-Shakspere controversy Mr. C. Stopes has made 
 a curious and interesting contribution. Whilst preparing some 
 articles on stimulants, Mr. Stopes was struck by the manner 
 in which intoxicants are referred to by Bacon and by Sbakspere. 
 This is an ingenious line of proof, and it has been ably carried out. 
 Mr. Stopes does not restrict himself to this evidence, but although 
 he argues the general 'Bacon-Shakspere question,' this is the most 
 original and telling part of his work. Bacon, he says, was a scientist, 
 and trade facts and processes were gathered and criticised by him. 
 He wrote about wine-making and about brewing, gave recipes for 
 preserving and doctoring, set forth the annals of the taxation of ale- 
 houses, composed a Natural History of Drunkenness, and indicated 
 hints for avoiding the physical effects of inebriety. But ' the moral 
 question never touched him ; not even in his Colours of Good and 
 Evil does he consider drink in relation to character. The physio- 
 logical effect is treated only physiologically. Man to him is but a 
 means of experimenting upon the various effects of spirit in wine.' 
 This is very well said." — Manchester Guardian (Leading Article), 
 Aug. 1 8th. 
 
 " The author of this book is perhaps better known in Glasgow as 
 Miss Charlotte Carmichael than as Mrs. Stopes. She takes up a 
 curious phase of the inquiry, which is a remarkably interesting one, 
 as throwing light on the habits and ideas of modern writers. The 
 book is able and interesting, and is certainly an important contribu- 
 tion to the great literary controversy." — Glasgow Herald, Aug. 30th. 
 
 " The controversy receives a fresh elucidation from this work by 
 C. Stopes. His is a remarkably quaint collection of curious matter 
 which ought to be examined by persons on both sides." — 'The Pub- 
 lishers' Circular, Aug. 15LI1.
 
 4 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 " Although the Bacon controversy has begun already to show 
 signs of flagging, there is quite enough vitality in it left to ensure 
 Mr. Stopes' essay all clue consideration." — The Bookseller, Sept. 5th. 
 
 " Differing in every single particular from the innumerable other 
 treatises lately published upon the matter, Mr. Stopes' volume, by 
 reason of its originality and the careful and painstaking manner 
 in which it has been compiled, deserves to receive the undivided 
 attention of all taking any interest in the controversy." — The City 
 P?-ess, Sept. 3rd. 
 
 "To those interested in this discussion a happier and more con- 
 clusive answer will not be found than this clever and scholarly 
 volume of Mr. Stopes." — The Citizen, Aug. 25th. 
 
 " Except for the reason that what is left unanswered may be 
 deemed by some persons to be unanswerable, it was hardly worth 
 while for lovers of Shakspere to defend the bard's memory from 
 the attacks of the American and other unfortunates afflicted with 
 the Baconian mania. In a volume by Mr. C. Stopes are collected 
 many interesting facts bearing on the problem, and this contribu- 
 tion to the ' Bacon-Shakspere Question ' will be certain to find 
 many readers. Altogether Mr. Stopes makes the Baconians seem 
 very ridiculous though laboriously industrious persons." — Liverpool 
 Courier, Oct. 17th. 
 
 "The cryptogrammic nut of Mr. Donnelly has been cracked, 
 pulverised, and utterly dissipated by a sledge-hammer blow from 
 Mr. C. Stopes." — The Norwich Mercury, Sept. 5th. 
 
 " Mrs. Stopes has her contrasts of Bacon and Shakspere ingeni- 
 ously developed, and her arguments are ingenious and novel and 
 cleverly worked out. The authoress, who is a Scotchwoman, deserves 
 an honourable place among the women who have devoted their time, 
 talents, and learning to Shaksperean studies. We congratulate her 
 upon her work, which, we trust, will receive the careful attention 
 to which its merits entitle it." — The Queen, Sept. 22nd. 
 
 "Mrs. Stopes is to be commended for her decision to bring the 
 evidence on the matter within the reach of the reading public. It 
 is only just to testify that her book shows adequate and patient 
 study of the subject, presenting as it does, in careful detail, the 
 historico-literary evidences which so completely discountenance 
 the Baconian hypothesis." — The Scottish Leader, Sept. 27th. 
 
 " The little volume on this question, to which we referred on 
 Wednesday as eminently suitable for sea-side reading, gives a great 
 variety of information, which will be appreciated by all who value 
 Shakspere' s works. The book is well arranged for reference, and 
 no lover of Shakspere will regret the possession of the varied stores 
 of information it contains." — Southport Guardian, Aug. 25.
 
 PRESS NOTICES. 5 
 
 "This book is unquestionably valuable, and deserves to be placed 
 among the best literary works of modern times." — The National 
 Guardian, Nov. 14th. 
 
 " In this volume Mr. Stopes seems to have struck upon a hitherto 
 unworked vein in this literary mine. . . . He deserves credit for his 
 diligence, and his treatment of a novel phase of this vexed question 
 entitles him to be heard as a witness for the defendant in Bacon v. 
 Shakspere." — The English Churchman, Oct. 4th. 
 
 "The Bacon-Shakspere question by C. Stopes is the first serious 
 attempt we have seen to answer Mr. Donnelly." — Weekly Times, 
 Sept. 2nd. 
 
 " Mr. Stopes has done a very useful public work by placing within 
 the reach of the people of this country a clear and decisive state- 
 ment of the proofs upon which pretty nearly all English litterateurs 
 rely in vindication of the unparalleled genius. He shows the utter 
 absurdity of Mr. Donnelly's wild contention that the philosophic 
 Bacon wrote the works of the 'immortal bard.' Mr. Stopes effec- 
 tually refutes Mr. Donnelly's childish arguments, and places Shak- 
 spere once more upon the seat from which Mr. Donnelly endea- 
 voured to dethrone him." — England, Sept. 15th. 
 
 " Mr. Stopes, an enthusiastic Shaksperean, has carefully collected 
 the arguments pro and con, together with many personal facts con- 
 nected with the two men. Mr. Stopes' arguments remove the uneasy 
 doubts raised by Mr. Donnelly. Those who have taken it up find the 
 book very interesting." — The Bucks Advertiser, Aug. 18th. 
 
 " After a long review no one can rise from the perusal of Mr. 
 Stopes' volume without having learned much from its wealth of 
 illustration and its sound common sense, and we are glad to know 
 that a cheaper issue at a shilling is also on sale. Original and well put 
 as the argument is, we hope to meet its author in other branches of 
 literature at no distant date." — The Printer and Stationer, Aug. 20th. 
 
 " Mr. Stopes has much to say, says it ably, temperately, and to our 
 thinking, speaking unofficially, says it conclusively ; speaking ex- 
 cathedra, we advise the reader to go through these pages carefully. 
 This is a book to be read and studied." — The Metropolitan, Sept. 1st. 
 
 " If all Shaksperean critics do their work as well as Mr. Stopes 
 has performed his task, the public will not have reason to complain. 
 Certainly, if any doubt ever existed in the brain of a sane indi- 
 vidual that Shakspere wrote the plays which bear his name, this 
 work will surely dispel any further scepticism in the matter. 
 Every authority, tradition, and incident, having any bearing on 
 Shakspere, is dealt with so exhaustively, thoroughly, and we 
 may add ably, that he must be an unbelieving Thomas indeed w ho 
 any longer refuses to acknowledge Shakspere as the writer of 
 all the dramatic and other works usually ascribed to him." — The 
 American Traveller, Aug. 25.
 
 6 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 " The Bacon-Shakspere question by C. Stopes, in addition to 
 pricking Donnelly's 'gas bag,' the great cryptogram, contains a vast 
 amount of curious as well as valuable information ; it will well re- 
 pay perusal, and readers who are not fortunate enough to possess 
 such works as Dr. Inglebyls Shakspere Allusion- Booh, cannot do 
 
 better than read very carefully the fourth chapter of this reply." 
 
 Blackburn Standard, Sept. ist. 
 
 "An able vindication of the right of Shakspere to the honour of 
 having written Shakspere's works. Mr. Stopes has managed to per- 
 form his task in a manner that renders his book very agreeable and 
 interesting reading. His mastery of the subject is shown on every 
 page."— Printers Register, Sept. 6th. 
 
 "Mrs. Stopes is a scholarly Shaksperean student, and the ridi- 
 culous hypothesis of the so-called 'Baconians' does not merit 
 demolition at the hands of such a champion ; but as the giving a 
 quietus has been the occasion for the production of an interesting 
 book, the result at least is not to be regretted."— Westminster Gazette, 
 Sept. ist. 
 
 " One result is that the public as well as the bibliopole have now 
 within easy reach such a collection of Shakspearean notabilia as 
 must hereafter prove very valuable."— The Birkenhead Advertiser, 
 Aug. 23rd. 
 
 " It is sufficient to signal theappearance of an interesting and erudite 
 contribution to the study of Shakspere." — Medical Press, Oct. 3rd. 
 
 "Mr. Stopes has compiled a most interesting and readable book, 
 and one that will gain him an honourable place among Shaksperean 
 students and lovers." — The British Mail, Sept. 1888. 
 
 " We can heartily congratulate Mr. Stopes on the result of his 
 reading." — Temperance Record, Aug. 23rd. 
 
 "By his method of working out his argument the author has 
 established his right to be reckoned with in the settlement of this 
 controversy." — The Literary World, Aug. 31st. 
 
 " What with suppressing this and falsifying that, in the ardour 
 of his bigotry, Professor Donnelly's ' Argument ' is a sustained and 
 vigorous indictment, which, to whose who are not something of 
 literary students, is likely to carry conviction. It is, therefore, 
 well to have the other side, not piecemeal in the pages of reviews 
 and periodicals, but adequately in that book form which can alone 
 do justice to a large subject. Mr. Stopes's answer is, we need not 
 say, very complete and most ably developed. Into the ample and 
 conclusive consideration of these divisions of his subject we cannot 
 of course follow Mr. Stopes ; but in the second one there is an 
 original argument advanced that ought to receive more attention 
 than we can give it here. This is a strange turn to give to a 
 learned controversy, but it is none the less a skilful one. Mr.
 
 PRESS NOTICES. 7 
 
 Stopes displays great skill in dealing with this portion of his task, 
 which affords fresh evidence of an extremely novel kind. It is 
 welcome as an additional proof, though the case which Mr. Stopes 
 has so admirably prepared is in itself a perfect vindication of 
 Shakspere's authorship of the plays and poems." — The Stage, 
 Aug. 24. 
 
 "This is a cleverly-written volume, in which the author brings 
 forward numerous proofs to show the illogical position occupied by 
 those who would dethrone Shakspere from the high estate he has 
 held for so many centuries. The work will be cordially welcomed 
 by believers in Shakspere." — The Northern Whig (Belfast), Sept. 5th. 
 
 " This is an interesting, intelligent, and suggestive little book on 
 the Bacon-Shakspere question. The spirit of the work is good." — 
 Life, Sept. 27th 
 
 " The author of this little book is a specialist. The success of 
 Mr. Donnelly's work is adequately tested, with the result that it 
 may be laughed out of existence. Mr. Stopes displays a full and 
 accurate acquaintanceship with the character and writings of both 
 Bacon and Shakspere. His method is happy, and convincing , to 
 all reasonable minds. The treatise winds up with the interesting 
 examination of Bacon's ciphers. To those interested in the question 
 a happier or more conclusive answer will not easily be found than 
 this clever and scholarly volume of Mr. C. Stopes." — The Ilawick 
 Advertiser, Aug. 27th. 
 
 " This book is neither uncalled for nor untimely. It should be 
 bought and studied by all for whom it is meant — admirers of Shak- 
 spere who have not the time at their disposal sufficient to thoroughly 
 investigate the points round which so much controversy has raged 
 of late." — Border Advertiser, Aug. 29th. 
 
 "We heartily welcome Mr. C. Stopes' contribution to this very 
 important question, which ought to find a place in every library." 
 — Durham Daily Advertiser, Sept. 7th. 
 
 " Mr. Stopes modestly opens an exceedingly able little work upon 
 the question of Shakspere's authorship of the works attributed to 
 him. It has often been asked, What reason is there to care very 
 much who really was the author, provided he was an Englishman ? 
 Bacon or Shakspere, the heritage is equally glorious, our apprecia- 
 tion equally keen. We hold there is a very great reason to care. 
 Mr. Stopes commences his argument on the psychological side of 
 the question, compares the works of each writer, and records the 
 notice of contemporaries. Suffice it to say, that it is treated with 
 exceedingly great accuracy, and a force of argument which perhaps 
 cannot be wholly attributed to Mr. Stopes, as the subject lends 
 itself to such powerful argument." — The Tablet, Sept. 1st.
 
 8 THE BACON-SHAKSPERE QUESTION. 
 
 "The answers are well and forcibly put, and ought to be read 
 far and wide. It is a very ably written book." — Stationer, Printer, 
 and Fancy Trachs Register, Sept. 7th. 
 
 "Mr. Stopes has produced some very interesting and curious 
 matter, and his work sbould find a ready sale amongst those who 
 have been au courunt in the controversy on this subject." — Freeman s 
 Journal, Sept. 7th. 
 
 " In support of his opinions Mr. Stopes gives us the result of his 
 studies on the subject of the authenticity of Shakspere's plays dur- 
 ing two years ; and, in a word, evolves from a vast amount of matter, 
 cleverly collated, a crushing reply to Mr. Donnelly and his cipher." 
 Public Opinion, Sept. 14th. 
 
 " If anything could kill the apparently exhaustless Shakspere- 
 Ilaconian theory, this scholarly volume of Mrs. Stopes might be ex- 
 pected to do it." — Englishicoma?i's Review, Sept. 15th. 
 
 " This book has been very extensively and also flatteringly re- 
 viewed, and we have been exceedingly amused by the unanimity 
 with which every critic we have seen has blundered respecting the 
 sex of the writer. Mrs. Stopes has produced a rich mine of infor- 
 mation, in which the student who lacks time and opportunity for 
 the original research she has given to the subject, may find to his 
 hand treasures of knowledge that he may amplify and retail. We 
 can truly say that Mrs. Stopes has exhausted this phase of the con- 
 troversy by the careful and painstaking way in which she has found 
 and dealt with all reference thereto." — Norivood Rcvino, Sept. 22nd. 
 
 " The recent attempt to revive a suggestion about Shakspere hav- 
 ing palmed off Bacon's plays as his own has ignominiously failed to 
 excite mankind except to rouse universal scorn on the vendor of so 
 ignorant a slander. But, perhaps, it is well that some one should 
 seriously treat the subject for the sake of future generations, and 
 logically unmask the foolish vanity of the intruder by minute investi- 
 gation of a critical and searching character. This is done in the 
 elaborate and conclusive book before us, which must have cost a 
 prodigious amount of labour, applied with consummate skill, by a 
 process of scientific reasoning that gives its author a high position 
 in Shaksperean literature. We will not criticise nor describe the 
 skilful method adopted by Mrs. Stopes in her adroit choice of tests 
 by which the relative works of Bacon and Shakspere are tested, save 
 to say that it cannot be confuted." — Croydon Guardian, Sept. 8th. 
 
 "This work is an able, temperate answer to those whom the 
 author dubs ' The Baconians.' " — Newcastle Daily Chronicle, Aug. 14th.
 
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